‘WHAT IS IT about music education in Queensland?’ This question is often asked when Australian music educators gather. Everyone seems to come from Queensland and everyone wants to go there. Perhaps part of the answer is that Queensland has a thirty-year history of compulsory music in the classroom, together with a vibrant and strongly supported instrumental program, unequalled elsewhere in Australia. No other state has produced as many successful international musicians, and popular media would have us believe that the other states are agog with disbelief. Billboard magazine named Brisbane in the ‘top 5 international music hot spots for 2007′ due to the number of emerging artists it boasts.

This is nothing new; in fact, there is a long sequence of Brisbands who have achieved success and prominence, from the Bee Gees through to The Veronicas. The litany of names includes such artists as The Avengers, The Saints, The Go-Betweens, Savage Garden, Powderfinger, george, Regurgitator, Custard, Resin Dogs, Butterfingers, The Butterfly Effect, The Boat People, The Grates, Andrew Morris, Pete Murray, Katie Noonan, Kate Miller-Heidke and Kate Bradley. If the extraordinary standard of the current crop of people studying popular music in programs like Griffith University’s Bachelor of Popular Music is any indication, this flood of talent will not dry up any time soon.