Welcome to the web pages of Carol Reffold - The Patchwork Poette

Carol is a Writer, Reciter, Patchwork Quilter and Researcher. She is passionate about Australian Bush Verse (rhyming, metered, ballad-style poems both poignant and silly) and is a great fan of her fellow poets and performers. Carol was born in the small village of Chilworth, Surrey, England, UK. She emigrated in 1960 and she began to write Bush Verse in 1994.

Whilst visiting the Bundaberg hinterland town of Dallarnil in 1995,during her visit to the annual rodeo, Carol was enchanted with the performance of an entertainer at the event who rode on a penny farthing bicycle during which a voice over the public address system recited A.B. Paterson’s Mulga Bill’s Bicycle in tandem with the performance. She described it as the most uniquely Australian thing that she had ever seen. Thus began her quest as a performer to share her love of Australia and its Bush Poetry with others.

Subsequently she joined the "Bundy Mob Bush Poetry Group" and thus began her journey to become a Bush Poet. She soon began performing her original poetry and the traditional works of Australia’s great bards with regular performances at the many bush poetry events and festivals throughout the country including Monto, Charleville, Hungerford, Millmerran, Brisbane & Emerald in Queensland.

In Victoria she has performed at Maldon, Corryong and Melbourne’s CBD, including a recent showcase performance for Victoria University and Melbourne’s Fringe Festival. Performances in NSW culminated with her being awarded Overall Ladies Performance Champion in the NSW Bush Poetry Championships, 2001. She has also performed at several bush poetry events during Tamworth’s annual Country Music Festival. Carol offers a charming and often humorous presentation on stage where she shows to perfection her obvious love of the craft and dedication as a performer.

In South Australia Carol has performed at Angle Vale, Andamooka, Murray Bridge and the CBD - In August, 2005 she was awarded Champion Poet at the Stumpy Festival in Murray Bridge - a most prestigious competition where people were invited Australia wide.

Carol has the amazing ability to take you along in your mind’s eye to the Heart of Australia, with its many trials, tribulations and triumphs which this patchwork land or ours revels in.

With a background as a legal secretary with a double degree in Psychology and Sociology, she then studied at Victoria University of Technology, a Small Companies and Community Theatre Course. She ran the largest poetry venue in Tamworth with a series of forty-four shows during their country music week. She is very well known around the Queensland and NSW’s North Coast Bush Poetry Circles. She is frequently employed as a judge of poetry events in Victoria and as a competitor can usually be seen in the finals.

Carol can be seen performing regularly at many diverse events, festivals, hobby groups, schools, churches, theatres, university classes, private parties, pubs, clubs, restaurants, radio and TV and competitions. She also is commissioned to write for special occasions. She is equally at home performing, or MC’ing, a show, in Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria or South Australia.

The other love of her life is patchwork and she has performed at the Queensland Patchwork and Quilt Convention in Bundaberg with some of her patchwork quilt stories.

Carol's ambition is to perform Australian Bush Poetry to international audiences - and she will!

 

These pages designed & maintained by Bushsong Web Design – Bendigo & Beyond.