TOOLANGI, VIC. — Music and poetry will come together in Toolangi on Sunday, November 8, when musician Maggie Somerville launches The Singing Garden, a new CD celebrating the 150th anniversary of the birth of one of Australia’s best-loved poets, C.J. Dennis.
The album features 13 poems from Dennis’s 1935 collection The Singing Garden, inspired by the birds that visited the ornamental garden he and his wife, Biddy, lovingly created at their Toolangi home. Somerville has set the poems to music, bringing Dennis’s distinctive verse to life through song.
The concert will feature Maggie singing and playing guitar, accompanied by Stephen Whiteside and friends on a variety of instruments, including fiddle, mandolin, banjo, ukulele, bass guitar, harp, flute, keyboards and percussion.
Poetry readings and a short story from the collection will also feature in the afternoon’s entertainment.
Born in Auburn, South Australia, in 1876, Dennis moved to Toolangi in 1908, where he lived for several years before achieving fame with The Songs of a Sentimental Bloke, published in 1915.
Its humour, memorable characters and distinctly Australian language captured the nation’s imagination, with copies even finding their way into the trenches of the First World War. His sequel, The Moods of Ginger Mick, was also hugely popular.
Dennis later worked for Melbourne’s Herald newspaper, producing daily verse on current events. Yet The Singing Garden remains a special tribute to his love of nature, featuring poems dedicated to 55 bird species.
The CD launch and concert will be held at The Singing Gardens Tearooms, 1694 Healesville-Kinglake Road, Toolangi, at 2pm on Sunday, November 8, 2026.
The event is free, and afternoon tea will be provided.
For enquiries, phone 0429 386 044.
