Kevin O’Donoghue keeps Australian traditions alive with interactive swaggie experience

Children’s entertainer Kevin O’Donoghue has been sharing Australian bush music and traditional instruments to help keep alive the tradition of bush music and culture from the Australia of the 1880s. 

Mr O’Donoghue has been entertaining children dressed as a modern day swagman (colloquially known as a swaggie) for almost 40 years, travelling from town to town in New South Wales and Queensland performing in preschools and early learning settings. 

He has become a favourite of children at Tenterfield Preschool Kindergarten, where he visited earlier this year, performing daily for half an hour singing about shearers, drovers and convicts.

“I am a living swagman to teach children our history before it’s lost forever,” he told local news source Tenterfield Star. 

“I wanted to immerse myself in that heritage, so I just followed in the spirit of the swagman.”

Tenterfield Preschool Kindergarten Director and Educational Leader, Joanne Willoughby, said the children were thoroughly inspired by the visits, with a number of them joining in with dancing, singing and playing musical instruments. 

The original coverage of this story may be found here.