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#33 GYPSIES and PILGRIMS

by Peter Kearney

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FULL LYRICS BELOW

NOTES on 'Gypsies and Pilgrims':
I wrote this song after completing a nine-week tour around Central and Eastern Australia. I travelled with my wife Madge and our daughter Niamh, who was then twelve years of age. Behind our van we pulled an old camper-van. Along the way, we offered concerts in eighteen places, including Broken Hill, Adelaide, Coober Pedy, Alice Springs, Darwin, Mount Isa and Townsville.

For us, and many we met in caravan parks and on the road, a journey like this was a kind of pilgrimage. We had all made a space in our lives and were visiting some of the great places of Australia ... the sacred sites of Australia. When I wrote the song I was thinking not only of us, but of those many others, venturing on their Australian pilgrimage.

Recorded in concert with the Crossover group.
*******

lyrics

GYPSIES AND PILGRIMS
At last we're on the road -
We've left our home to journey through the land
In our patched-up camper-van
To places where you must travel light to go.
From the Apple-isle to the northern parts of Queensland
Through the Isa and the Alice, further west;
As we venture on the back roads of this country
Couldn't say which road we like the best.

And the life we left behind
Was like a groove we slotted in each day.
There was nothing fresh to find
And as we were, there wasn't much to say.
Now life flows and we like the conversation
Of the people that we meet as we travel on
And the children think we're mad but we're not sure yet.
We've become like pilgrims on the road.

Like children with eyes big and round
Discovering the beauties of this land.
Just like pilgrims of the days gone by
We've come to know we stand on sacred ground.

Gypsies on the road, that's what we are.
Where tomorrow? - we don't know.
And round a fire in the night
Something shines that never shone so bright.
We could pack up in the morning and move on again
We could travel half a world in half a day
Crossing over the tracks of blackman's dreaming -
Lots to learn for us pilgrims on the way.

Like children with eyes big and round
(We are) discovering the wonders of this land.
Just like pilgrims in a modern way
We've come to know we stand on sacred ground.

Gypsies on the road -
We've left our homes to journey through the land
In our patched-up campervans
To places where you must travel light to go.
We're not lost, though they say we're hard to find now.
For the time to come we have no fixed abode
As we venture on the back roads of this country
We've become like gypsies on the road.
And as we stumble to the heart of solid mystery
We've become like pilgrims on the road.

Words and music by Peter Kearney
The penultimate line is a quote from a poem by Niamh Kearney .

credits

released April 25, 2020
*****
RELATED RESOURCES
There is no music notation for 'Gypsies and Pilgrims'.
It is one of seventeen tracks on the album LIVE ... IN THE LAND OF AUSTRALIA'. Enquiries welcome.

THE RECORDING:
PETER KEARNEY (vocals, guitar)
with the group CROSSOVER:
HELEN ARCHER (vocals & percussion)
MAX BURGESS (electric double bass).
LINDSAY MARTIN (electric violin)
CLAIRE PARKHILL (vocals & recorder)

RECORDED in concert at St. John's Hall, Dapto. Nov 22, 1990.
KENNY MILLER (recording engineer).
Mixed at Abergeldio Studio, Mittagong.

COPYRIGHT © 1988 Peter Kearney.
This song is registered with One License, APRA and AMCOS.
Church and school licences through 'One License'.
E: info@onelicense.net

TO SEE ALL SONGS posted so far: peterkearney.bandcamp.com

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Peter Kearney Mittagong, Australia

Peter Kearney is an Australian songwriter and singer. His early folk-hymns 'Fill My House' & 'The Beatitudes' are internationally known. He has written many other songs of justice and peace, songs for children, and a musical-narrative on St. Francis of Assisi. His published recordings include 153 original songs.

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