Lee Kernaghan - “Outstanding Achievement Award” for Spirit of the Anzacs
It was with absolute pleasure and pride that I had the opportunity to present my good friend Lee Kernaghan the Outstanding Achievement Award for his album Spirit of the Anzacs at the ARIAs on 26 November 2015.
It was a wonderful and poignant moment when the large crowd paused and paid their respects to this moving tribute from one of Australia’s great story tellers which puts the words of Australian soldiers to music.
Lee and his collaborator Garth Porter spent hours in the Australian War Memorial archive, collecting letters penned by diggers to their loved ones at home, spanning the First World War to the present day. Each song on the 16-track recording is inspired by real letters. The spirit of the men and women who wrote them, their courage and sacrifice lives in these songs – and in us.
Lee considers this album to be some the most powerful material that he has recorded in his long and distinguished career. The album takes the listener on a journey from the Gallipoli landing and the trenches of the Western Front to the dust of Uruzgan in Afghanistan. It is a project that brought our history to life and goes to the heart of who we are as a nation.
Spirit of the Anzacs was the highest selling Australian album of the year, spending four weeks at number 1. All Australians can be proud of this - at the Australian War Memorial, we certainly are.
The Spirit of the Anzacs video is playing permanently in the Memorial’s galleries.
Images courtesy of Sam MacDonald