Professor John Anderson Singing "Those Sydney Blues"

Audio tape, cassette tape copy and two CDs (one holding digital files) of Professor Anderson singing "Those Sydney Blues". Recorded in New Zealand by Peter Platt, Professor of Music. Item also includes digital files stored on a CD.

O those Sydney Blues, O those Sydney Blues,
I'm stuck here in Magdalen, maudlin with those Sydney Blues

I was puntin' up the Cherwell, lookin' for a shady arbour
I was puntin' up the Cherwell, lookin' for a shady arbour
And I said to my flamin' self "This ain't a patch on our harbour"

O those Sydney Blues, O those Sydney Blues,
I'm stuck here in Magdalen, maudlin with those Sydney Blues

I was sittin' on a hard bench listenin' to Professor Ryle
I was sittin' on a hard bench getting nouns and verbs from Ryle
And the thought came flashin' through my mind "John's got them beat by a mile"

O those Sydney Blues, O those Sydney Blues,
I'm stuck here in Magdalen, maudlin with those Sydney Blues

I was walkin' up the High Street with Strawson in my hair
I was walkin' up the High Street with Strawson in my hair
But all I could think of was old Jamieson Street - Gee, I'd rather be there

O those Sydney Blues, O those Sydney Blues,
I'm stuck here in Magdalen, maudlin with those Sydney Blues

I went to tutes with Austin and all that he could say
Was make a recommendation or else be on your way
So I recommended Sydney it beats Oxford any day

O those Sydney Blues, O those Sydney Blues,
I'm stuck here in Magdalen, maudlin with those Sydney Blues

I called on Doug McCallum and he said "It gets ya thinkin'"
I called on Doug McCallum and he said "It gets ya thinkin';"
I said "Boy it ain't the College - you did better at the Lincoln"

O those Sydney Blues, O those Sydney Blues,
I'm stuck here in Magdalen, maudlin with those Sydney Blues

They pointed out their Tom Tower built in the time of Pharoah
They pointed out their Tom Tower built in the time of Pharoah
I said "If you want a phallus what about our Trocadero?"

O those Sydney Blues, O those Sydney Blues,
I'm stuck here in Magdalen, maudlin with those Sydney Blues.

Song for the Andersonians

This recording of Professor John Anderson, Challis Professor of Philosophy from 1927 to 1958 [Ref 1], singing 'Those Sydney Blues' was made by Professor Peter Platt, who twenty years later became Professor of Music at the University [Ref 2].

There was second recording made of the same song in 1961, which acknowledges this 1955 recording. Graham Pont, in Don Laycock: Collector and Creator of Dirty Songs, writes, "In 1961, the late Professor John Anderson of Sydney University visited Canberra with his wife and stayed for several days at University House. Being a former student of his, I had some social contact with the old couple; but, as in my student days, Anderson was by then less convivial and more remote than he had been in his legendary past, which was coextensive with the Golden Age of Sydney University. One evening after dinner, I was practicing the recorder in my room when Anderson came knocking at the door - drawn there by the orphic tones of a Vivaldi concerto. On this occasion, the philosopher was in a convivial mood; and somehow Laycock turned up too. After a couple of drinks, Laycock suggested that he might record some of Anderson's songs - we had heard about them many times but never been present at a performance. Anderson was a bit hesitant at first; but he finally agreed to sing three of his songs: 'Joking Jesus', 'Sydney Blues' and 'Philosophical Blues' (the last two being his own compositions). Laycock recorded these three on his beautiful 'Bayer' machine and then asked Anderson to sing some more...The songman won; and, like so many informants in the field, he refused to divulge any more to the intruding anthropologist...But Laycock did manage to record those three precious songs - wonderful memories of old Sydney University...Laycock's title, as announced on the tape, is 'Song for the Andersonians'. To my knowledge, there is only one other recording of Anderson's singing - a single song in the possession of Peter Platt, the retiring Professor of Music at Sydney University"...'Sydney Blues' is the lament of the homesick Andersonian in exile at Oxford. Anderson himself was an exile, in Australia". [Ref 3].

The Challis Professor of Philosophy in 1975, Professor DM Armstrong, wrote a piece in Record, the University Archives' journal, providing some background to the song, "The University of Sydney Archives is building up a collection of the papers and other memorabilia of the great Scots-Australian educator and philosopher, John Anderson...It is not intended that the collection should be confined to Anderson's academic work, but that it should also reflect other interests of this. Anderson liked jazz and blues, and he used to compose blues himself...As a literary composition it [the piece, 'Those Sydney Blues'] is perhaps not one of his best blues, but it is certainly the most famous...Anderson had no love for the school of Linguistic Philosophy, then flourishing in Oxford, led by such men as Professor Gilbert Ryle, John Austin and P.F. Strawson, and had no doubt of his own philosophical superiority. The blues was written for Peter Gibbons, a student of Anderson's, at that time a post-graduate student at Magdalen, now Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of N.S.W...Doug McCallum, now Professor of Political Science at the same university, was another Andersonian student at Oxford at the same time. The Lincoln was a famous coffee shop in the late forties and fifties, conveniently situated in Rowe Street, just opposite the Long Bar of the Australia Hotel. The Tom Tower of Christ Church is, of course, one of Oxford's most famous erections. The Trocadero, a dance-hall in George Street, near the Town Hall, now pulled down, had a rather strange edifice on its roof". [Ref 4].

O those Sydney blues...O those Sydney blues...

This item is part of the University Archives' 70 Years, 70 Stories series, created to celebrate our 70th birthday on 3 May 2024. To discover more stories, explore the 70 Years, 70 Stories collection.

Ref 1: Anderson, John, [PER-00000028]. University of Sydney Archives.

Ref 2: University of Sydney Calendar 1975 Vol 1 (1975), p. 47, [REF-00021106]. University of Sydney Archives.

Ref 3: Professor John Anderson Singing Three Songs (1961), [REF-00088316]. University of Sydney Archives.

Ref 4: Record Vol 3 No 2 (Sep 1975), pp. 9-10, [REF-00019087]. University of Sydney Archives.