Dougie Young

Who is Dougie Young?

Dougie Young was a singer and songwriter from South West Queensland. Young had a white father and a Gurnu mother.

Earlier in his life he worked as a stockman, during which he learnt the guitar and started writing songs. A riding accident later ended his working as a stockman. In 1963 or 64 Jeremy Beckett, an anthropologist made field recordings of Young, many of which were released in 1965 as an ep called Land Where the Crow Flies Backwards. The title track has since been covered by Gary Shearston, Athol McCoy and Chad Morgan. He was recorded twice more, first in Walgett in 1969 and then in Sydney in 1979. Songs from these three recordings were released by AIATSIS in 1993 as The Songs of Dougie Young

Young sang "Cut A Rug", a drinking song from his troubadour days in the Wilcannia in the 50s and 60s, in both the SBS documentary and accompanying cd, Buried Country: The Story of Aboriginal Country Music.

Young's song The Land Where the Crow Flies Backwards was added to the National Film and Sound Archive's Sounds of Australia registry in 2013.