Bush songs

The people first brought to Australia to displace the indigenous population were English and Irish pick-pockets, poachers and other social misfits. They brought their traditional folk-music with them. And they adapted to their new circumstance.

In 1964, John Manifold compiled a popular collection of Australian fold music as The Penguin Australian  Song Book. In it, he groups the songs under the headings: Seamen and Transport, Immigrants and Diggers, The Bushrangers, Pastoral Australia, The Nomads and The Poets.

in 1980, Bill Scott compiled The Second Penguin Australian Songbook. Bill's book also groups the songs ... this time under the subjects: Toilers of the Bush, From Sydney and the Bush, With Malice Aforethought, Immigrants, Tragedies and Deaths, Songs Out of Uniform and Recent Arrangements and Compositions.

There are numerous other collections and compilations of Australian folk songs.

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