5RAR BAND ON NUI DAT
CHRISTMAS 1966
(This photograph is of the band on the horseshoe).
Around Christmas 1966, between operations, the 5RAR Band, AKA our stretcher bearers (combat medics), came to D Company at our company base on Nui Dat hill to play for us.
I had just returned from R and R in Singapore where I had purchased a large reel-to-reel, steam driven (well, valves not transistors) Akai tape recorder. As the band played outside the Company CP I ran out a power lead, microphone
cables (stereo yet!), etc and, after the machine had taken forever to warm up to a working condition, I managed to capture the last item of the alfresco performance, “Retreat”. In the middle of the piece there can be heard a Bandmaster’s command, followed by a short pause during which the just discernible sound of a “Wallaby Airlines” Caribou taking off from Luscombe Field, about half a kilometer to the North, can be heard.
At the end of the piece there is another pause in which the Caribou is heard overhead back-grounding Bandmaster Bob Taylor’s command to the Band to “Fall Out” (to the Bull and Bra Boozer, of course)!
I had the original tape recording cleaned up and captured on disc after some forty years of laying stored in various drawers and suffering many removals.
Despite being long forgotten and completely ignored for so long, the quality is not too bad and it may yet be useful as an historic item for use on suitably solemn or ceremonial occasions. While I hold copyright to the recording, I am more than happy for it to be used for any purposes relating to 5RAR or 5RAR Association activities or by any former member of 5RAR for his personal or private purposes only, without reference to me. Otherwise, it may be used only with my written permission.
Ron Boxall