Wayne Horsburgh

b. 11 June 1955, Lima, near Benalla, Victoria, Australia. Horsburgh grew up on the family’s dairy farm and was given his first guitar at the age of eight. His interest in country music began when he used to listen to his father’s Hank Snow and Wilf Carter records. When he was aged 11, he sang with a local dance band and made the finals of a national television programme in Melbourne. After completing his high school studies in 1971, he spent four years working for the State Savings Bank, first in Benalla and later in Melbourne. However, in August 1973, after seeing Slim Whitman during an Australian tour, he decided upon a career in country music. Impressed by Whitman’s clever use of falsetto, he practised and soon became a proficient yodeller, a talent that endeared him to his American audiences when, some years later, he made regular visits to the USA. He finally achieved his breakthrough in 1978, when he was offered the opportunity to tour with the travelling show of Australian legend Buddy Williams. He benefited greatly from this experience and soon built up a popular stage act of his own. Now a household name in Australia thanks to major television shows such as Reg Lindsay’s Country Homestead and the Midday Show and countless country radio shows, he has already won many awards. He divides his time between Australia and the USA, where he has toured and appeared with such stars as Roy Rogers, Riders In The Sky and the Sons Of The Pioneers. His recordings have resulted in Australian hits such as ‘Lover’s Carousel’, ‘Shepherd’s Farewell’, ‘September’s Sweet Child’ (released in the UK on Yodelling Crazy by EMI Records in 1992) and ‘Give ’Em Another Encore’. In 1991, he recorded an album of songs of the singing cowboys, which, as a lover of the style of Rogers and Gene Autry, represented the fulfilment of a lifelong ambition. He made a brief visit to the UK in 1992, where his yodelling and country ballads endeared him to British country music audiences. In 1994, he recorded his first Nashville-based album. His all-round friendly and courteous manner, in addition to the fact that he always finds time to meet his fans, places Horsburgh as one of the most popular of the modern Australian artists.