Bound for Botany Bay

A new performance by PP Cranney and Christina Mimmocchi premiered at Southern Sydney Folk Club in March 2020. Due to Covid-19 restrictions, all subsequent live performances have been postponed. However look out for the show, even bigger and brighter, in 2021.

Here's a video clip from the end of the SSFC show - we've got the audience singing along to "Always Was, Always Will Be ... Aboriginal Land!". What a positive note to end on.

Now back to the story ...

"How good is this!"

From the creators of Lola’s Keg Night, Amulet and 1917 Strike, comes a brand-new musical storytelling show celebrating the 250th anniversary of Cook’s circumnavigation of Australia!

What a miracle that was!

Apart from about thirty Spanish, Dutch, Portuguese and English explorers before him, Captain James Cook was the first European to discover Australia. Despite Government orders to cultivate the friendship of any inhabitants, and not to take possession of the land if indeed it was inhabited, Captain (aka Lieutenant) Cook, shot the first natives he saw, took possession of the place in the name of the King, and had it declared it Terra Nullius – empty land - which came as a great surprise to the estimated 750,000 plus Indigenous inhabitants living here at the time …

… and which proved to be an ongoing tragedy for them and unfinished business for the rest of us.

But let’s not get tangled up in our black armbands. As well as giving out free oranges to ensure the audience doesn’t get scurvy, we’ll give you the alt.history lesson you never got in primary school.

Learn Dutch sea shanties! Patriotic French songs! Clever parodies of famous ballads!

Sing along to both kinds of music: traditional and original folk!

Listen and laugh at spoken word (occasionally shouted, whispered and mumbled)!

Join Christina Mimmocchi, PP Cranney and friends (newsflash: Darlene Proberts has just joined the cast) as they "endeavour" to entertain you on the voyage of a lifetime to Botany Bay.

How good is that?*

(*Rhetorical question. Terms and conditions apply. See your doctor if symptoms persist.)

Listen to a demo of "Elizabeth" about Cook's wife. Co-written by Karen Law and Christina Mimmocchi

Listen to a demo of "Yumba" - a song originally sung by Shirley Fish, and recorded by Hazel de Burgh in 1950 on the shores of Botany Bay

Christina, Tomas and Chris, Margaret, Don and Tom from 40 Degrees South cooking up sea shanty "Down Among the Dead Men"

PP Cranney