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Nat Grant: Welcome to season seven of the Prima Donna Podcast, Sonic

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Portraits of Australian Artists. This audio was recorded and produced on Wurundjeri Country, where I pay

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respects to elders past and present. To find out more about the project and to hear more episodes like this

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one, visit prima donna podcast.com.

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The second episode in this series features a posthumous portrait of jazz

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drummer and band leader Alma Quon. Born in 1911 in Bendigo, Alma was one of seven children with all

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the girls in the family taking music lessons from a young age.

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She moved to Melbourne in the 1930s and performed in the all woman jazz band

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the Merry Makers with her sister Lorna. The Quon sisters played with the Mary makers up until the Second World War.

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In 1941, Alma formed her own band, the Joy Belles.

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A group of women from mixed cultural backgrounds also featuring Lorna.

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With Alma on drums, the Joy Belles played for several years

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at dances and functions in and around Melbourne, and were still

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performing up until the 1990s.

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In 1995, an exhibition at the Performing Arts Museum titled

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Sweethearts of Melbourne paid homage to bands such as the Merry Makers

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and Alma Quon and her Joy Belles. Alma and Lorna's Chinese ancestry was referenced with Chinese style lettering

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on the drum kit, and their musical set occasionally included a popular Chinese

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song played on Western instruments. Alma gave dance lessons to children at state primary schools all across

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Victoria and was known for her hard work, focus, and no nonsense approach

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to both teaching and performing. She passed away at the age of 90.

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I was fortunate in preparation for this episode to record a conversation

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with Alma's nephew Ray Quon from the Australian Rock Band, the Blue Echoes.

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Ray has many fond memories of growing up at Alma's gigs and the

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special connection they had thanks to their shared love of music.

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All the drumming in this episode was performed and recorded by Luc Yong.

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Ray Quon: Yes, I really, really appreciate the past, you know,

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especially when there's a bit of history in people of, you know,

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are very, like yourself, very interested in, in all of this.

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And, um, but it wasn't until she passed away that the real interest came out.

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She, she initiated, uh, I think she wasn't a follower,

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except that wasn't her band. I think after that then she formed her own band and, uh, cause she realized

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that the war was gonna go on I think. That's the way I think that she would've thought that, uh, the

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war was gonna go on for a while. So I think I'll get in on the ground floor.

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She got taught up at the convent up there at Rutherglen, and then she came

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down and I think that she, um, I don't think she went and had lessons at all,

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but there was another sister called Amy who lived in New South Wales.

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She was probably the best piano player.

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She's best one of the lot. She used to come down from Sydney and they used to play

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for duos and all the rest of it. To my knowledge, she didn't get taught.

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She wasn't taught anymore. She just learnt, you know, learned it herself.

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Alma, uh, I was always.

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Uh, we were on the same level. Uh, for example, you know, we'd go over and see her and I'm this high

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10 or 11, she had no time for my other members of the family, even her

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own brother and, uh, and my younger sister because they didn't play music.

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So she used to usher them out the back and she said, She used to talk

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to me like, um, come on Raymond.

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She said, we'll go and talk some music. The others can, uh, amuse themselves in the back room

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reading some magazines, you know. And, uh, so we'd sit down, and we'd talk for ages and ages on music.

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She was interested in what I was doing, and of course I was

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interested in what she was doing. And it got to one stage

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when our band, the Echoes were very popular.

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You know, we were on radio, we were on TV, you name it.

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And she rang me up and whenever she rang me up, I knew that

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there was something happening. So I'd drive over to her place.

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She lived in Kew, lived there for years, and she'd call me in, sit me down like

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we're doing, and she'd say, now, Raymond

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I need some information from you. She says, we're not getting the work that we used to, and they were

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in their seventies then, you know, and let's face it, they, they'd

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probably seen better days as the band, a lot of them had passed away.

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She said, I need to get into this music that you're doing,

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this rock and roll music. And I said, oh, okay.

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She said, I'll do a deal with you. And she was a very astute businesswoman.

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She says, I'll teach you how to do all the proper intros and dance tempos,

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which came in handy to me later on when I was doing the old time dances,

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you know, like the, the modern waltzes

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all the six eights and they were, had to be right spot on.

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So she taught me those and I taught her how to rock and roll.

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And she was so grateful.

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And I was so grateful too. So we had that type of relationship and then she, she said, I'd

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like you to take over the band. And, uh, I said, well, uh, it was a bit of an awkward situation.

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She said, well, you are the only one with the Quon name.

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She said, no one else can. She said, and I want it to, to go on.

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So, um, anyway, yeah, she, so memory started to go at that

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stage, so it, it never eventuated.

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Well, she learnt piano. And, uh, they, the, the two girls that's Lorna and Alma.

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Iris wasn't born at that time. They lived at Rutherglen and their mum and dad, my grandparents, they

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came out from well my grandfather did from China and they set up

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the general store in Rutherglen. They had that for years and there were seven kids.

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They got taught the music at a convent up there.

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And then when they came down to Melbourne, I think Alma

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then sought to learn the drums.

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And that's when she played at these big, uh, teaching the kids at school.

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She would play the drums and of course she was out there in front of the kids

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and she'd also play piano sometimes.

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But, um, you know, there's something up to about 800 kids at these schools and

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I went out and saw them cuz I was one of those kids that, that got taught too at

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school, we all did every, all the kids.

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Um, but, uh, anyway, I went out to see her and, um, just to give you

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an example of where she was at.

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If one of the kids started crying, you know, the seven or eight

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year old kids, the normal mother female would say, now don't cry.

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You'll be, you'll be right. What's wrong? Do you want a hanky dear, but not Alma.

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Uh, she'd say she's crying.

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Please, can we replace her? And it was, even then, I realized it was so embarrassing, but that.

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Yeah, the show must go on. Yeah.

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I think that her work escalated when the Second World War came along

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because all the guys went overseas.

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The only bands there were really was, uh, Alma's Band

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plus a couple of the others. So they got a heap of work and I remember that one.

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I was. Very small in the early fifties.

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I can remember, you know, my dad saying, well, Alma's, the band are

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doing a lot of work, was when the guys came back from the Second World War.

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They were one of the few female bands that kept going.

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A lot of them just fell by the wayside cuz she was a professional.

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That was, her, you know, income and she was, uh, right into it

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and they did all the mural balls. That one there was taken, I think it was at Myer, what are they called?

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Before my time at Myer Music Hall, that's where all the big functions,

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was probably like the equivalent of the Arts Centre, I suppose now.

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So they used to do all those big private functions.

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They didn't record. Unfortunately, to my knowledge, I've got no recordings of them.

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Even at home here, you know? playing music, which is a shame.

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They all could read music, you know, they were all good.

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They didn't tour like overseas or anything like that, but there was

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just so much work, especially during the war years and everything that's,

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that's where they made their mark.

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And I used to look forward to going in on the train with my mother

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and, uh, Alma played at a, a place called the Gay Paris, which was a,

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a French orientated eating place.

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With the spiral staircase that used to go down and Alma could see me coming

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down, she'd say over the microphone, now my nephew Raymond is coming down.

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Didn't mention my mum. And if he's in a good mood, I might get him to play piano And I.

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Freaked out because I was learning classical and you, when you're

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learning classical, you know, your repertoire is very minimal.

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So, but anyway, she knew what she was doing and that sort of, uh, made me

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comfortable in front of strangers from, you know, from about 18 years of age.

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That would've been in the mid, mid fifties

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when I was a bit older. They used to have functions, big functions that they'd play at once

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a year, being of Chinese extract.

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We used to have a , it was a organization called the YCL, which

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was the young Chinese league, and all the Chinese used to go there.

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And Alma had the band set like that, seven, you know,

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with the yellow outfits. And they'd play there.

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And, uh, she'd get me up to sing.

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And also she used to play at the, uh, Cheltenham Repat Hospital.

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I think that's what it was called. It was a hospital for all the returned soldiers from the second World War.

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Huge place on the corner of Warrigal and Kingston Road in Cheltenham.

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And, uh, you know, there'd be lots and lots of people there.

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And, uh, There was quite a few private functions and occasionally she

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used to ring me, uh, ring me up and not me, but my parents and say,

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um, look, I think you should take Raymond to this job that I'm doing.

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She said, I think he'd be very interested in it.

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And they might've played a little bit of rock and roll, you know, something.

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So that was good. My auntie on the violin was an exceptionally good player and she played

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at a couple of the festival hall shows that came out cuz when she passed away I

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found a couple of programs in the case.

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Yeah. Which are worth a bit of money now. When Bill Haley came out, her name is Lorna.

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Lorna played violin. Yeah. Now, well they're all passed away to my knowledge now, but the trumpet player

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in the band, Moya, Moya Brown has her name come up there?

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Yes. Well, she ended up buying Alma's Home.

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When I was very small, she lived in O'Shannassy St Kew, and then

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Alma moved over to Henry Street Kew, which was just over the road.

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Big house. Moya Brown, I think I'm correct, bought Elmer's Place in O'Shannassy St.

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And she used to, well her and her husband had a circus.

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And, uh, and in O'Shannassy St, she used to have monkeys there in on

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the premises, cages and everything. I used to love going over there.

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So she was a bit of a character. Nat Grant: So Alma was married but didn't have any children?

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Ray Quon: Yes. And, and Lorna was married also and never had any.

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Yep. Nat Grant: And were their husbands supportive of their music?

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Ray Quon: Supportive but not involved. Probably the only involvement would be that Lorna never drove anywhere.

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So her husband, Glen would take her some, or I think in the early days they

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used to catch, um, public transport.

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And I can remember my dad saying, and I said to my dad, my dad's

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got two brothers, and the last.

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Passed away a couple of years ago at 101, Dennis.

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Cause I remember saying to my dad, I said, oh, I said, cause my dad

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loved music on this piano too.

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The same piano. I got this in 1950 something and mum and dad bought it for me.

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And I've always kept it, you know. But I said, dad, I said, why didn't you get taught music?

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And he said that none of the boys got taught music.

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Because mum and dad couldn't afford it, and their parents wanted the

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girls to get a good grounding, which they did, but all the boys did was

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help them get on the tram and bus and accompany them on public transport.

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And my dad was really, um, he, he really would've loved to have learnt music.

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So that's why they insisted that I, and Alma was very, you know, Raymond

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must be taught music and there's a picture I think in there of all

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the family and it shows the boys.

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That's Alma's brother. And brother and son playing the saxophone.

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Nat Grant: Okay. Ray Quon: They taught themselves a little bit.

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Yeah. Yeah, but they never, they never had formal lessons

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and uh, I was a pretty good golfer when I was about 13, you know, school

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boy runner up golf champion Victorian school boy and, uh, only and found

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out that that was in 1960 that, uh, my dad didn't have long to live.

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So Alma, uh, lined me up a, a job and I had a job offer to me in the golf

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club is a, . A young kid, you know, learning all the ropes, and Alma

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said, no, Raymond will make more money playing music than he will playing golf.

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Now. , initially , she was right, but the golfers now, they, they earn

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much more than most musicians. Nat Grant: You've been listening to the Prima Donna Podcast.

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I would like to thank Ray Quon, Kay Dreyfus, Claudia Funder, and Luc

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Yong for their help with research and preparation for this episode.

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To find out more about the project and to hear more episodes like this

16:52

one, visit prima donna podcast.com.