CJ Shaw's show All Sorts at The Street Theatre on Saturday will be his last in Canberra for a while as the popular musician and teacher heads north with his young family.
The show is a matinee, at 4pm on Saturday, a chance for the whole family to escape the festive rush and sit back and enjoy music that cuts across the generations, including his hits ANZAC Biscuits and Aint' Many Like Lennie. Many fellow musicians are coming together to make his show is one to remember.
"I'm sad to be leaving," he said. "I was driving down Northbourne just now thinking, 'I'm going to miss this place'."
Originally from the Blue Mountains, CJ moved to Canberra seven years ago from East Timor. He's been a much-loved teacher, for the last five years at Palmerston District Primary School where he was nominated for an ARIA for Music Teacher of the Year in 2020.
He and his partner and their daughters will be moving to Murwillumbah to be closer to family and his show on Saturday is a farewell to Canberra as much as anything else.
He'll be joined by his band The Blow-Ins, a kids' choir, props (thanks to mother-in-law Anne McAlpine) and visual projections. The show's name All Sorts, is about making sure there is something for everyone.
"If you've got three generations, you're all going to like something in the show, but all come together to watch it. And that's my dream," he said.
Shaw has a style of music that is part folk, part Australiana, part straight-out fun in which he tells 100 per cent wonderful stories, the most recently seen in his new single, Lonely Road.
"There's a lot of narratives in there and hopefully enable my audience to leave happier and smarter," he said.
"My analogy is teaching music and being a musician is like living in a duplex. On one side, you've got the educator and on the other side you've got the performer," he said.
"Sometimes the walls in the duplex aren't well insulated, so you can hear a lot and spy over into the other year and get some ideas on what's happening. I've always said being a musician greatly benefits me being a teacher and being a teacher greatly benefits me being a musician. I always love to have both those things in my life."
Shaw's song Ain't Many Like Lennie, released last year, about the boy who rode his horse from Victoria to Sydney to see the opening of the Harbour Bridge, was accompanied by a gorgeous video by Canberra stop-action animators Eleanor Evans and Giovanni Aguilar. The video won Best Music Video and Best Animation (Canberra) at the recent Canberra Short Film Festival.
Evans and Aguilar have collaborated with Shaw on the All Sorts show to bring even more wonderment and magic to the occasion, with props and puppets from the video.
"Having The Street Theatre support the show and the vision of the show has been really encouraging," he said.
Bookings for the show can be made at www.thestreet.org.au/ or on 6247 1223
