Dawn grew up in the heart of the Cotswold’s in the UK where her family, who were professional pianists, introduced her to classical piano. However, she didn’t take to the piano, it wasn’t quite the platform from which she needed to express herself so after more than a few years in the wilderness she found herself on Australian shores as a young adult. Words and writing had always been her passion, but it was a bit later that she began to turn her words into songwriting material. The guitar became the perfect vehicle to give rhythm, melody and expression to her stories. The way in which she emotionally connects to the songs has likened her to artists such as Joan Baez, Margaret Roadknight, Janis Ian and Bob Dylan.
To date Dawn has released an EP “Voices”, a Single “Women of War” and an Album “Break of the Day”. Women of War has received a lot of attention on Youtube and had a considerable amount of airplay on stations across Australia including ABC Regional. Dawn has been performing across WA at local festivals, clubs and venues and she recently released her debut album “Break of the Day” at Nannup Music Festival. Sydney is one of her favourite city’s to visit and perform.
Thompson has the gift of bringing a song to life. His passion for music is matched with a powerful voice and uncanny affinity with guitar. His natural wit and exuberance In combination with a history of theatre, TV and film work makes for the ultimate entertainment experience through music. Delivering both audience favourites and indie gems, Greg's repertoire includes songs by Crowded House, Coldplay, Jackson Browne and a number of Australian songwriters.
Braithwaite has dedicated many years to expressing and developing her creativity through the medium of dance as a choreographer, performer and muse and brings the full range of this knowledge and experience to her music. Her adventures crooning in the classy bars of San Francisco's Mission District tapped into an innate musical gift , evident in the intuitive freedom of her soaring vocals, and inspired an ongoing fascination with the spellbinding potential of the chanteuse.
“Dawn’s last song was “Cross to Bear” about the powerful people in the world and their effects. Done with a Celtic rhythm there’s a sense of anger, passion and determination in the song. It’s almost like it’s built like an aural protest march, that’s striving to right some of the wrongs in society. A top performance Dawn, brining a bit WA music into the Society’s monthly Concert.” - G. Fitzgerald (The Songwriting Society of Australia Magazine Sept 2016)
“Inspired by a documentary on the women left behind by war, Great Southern Institute of Technology’s Dawn Barrington has released her single, Women of War…….Ms Barrington said the song was an important one for her and she wanted use her music to highlight other social issues. Ms Barrington will be playing at the Denmark Festival of Voice this weekend.” - T Wolfe (Albany Advertiser May 2015)
“Dawn Barrington is a folk singer from Western Australia and I became aware of her music in September of 2014 when I downloaded her track Voices from AMRAP. Early 2015 saw the release of the single “Women of War” to coincide with the 100th anniversary of Gallipoli and put the war in a perspective not often acknowledged, that of the women who either took part directly or who stepped up to support the war effort from Australia as well as generally keeping the home fires burning.
I would describe Dawn’s music as a set of carefully crafted lyrics’ riding an original meandering tune to simultaneously arrive at a point.
A few months back, Dawn toured the east coast for the first time and I was lucky enough to have her as a guest on Rare Traxx & Eclectic where she sang live in the studio. Later that same week, I went to the Illawarra Folk Club to see Dawn perform live. I witnessed a very warm exchange between artist and audience which I thoroughly enjoyed.
I look forward to Dawns next visit and the possibility of seeing her perform live at a house concert venue.” - Michael Hayes (Producer, 2MCR 100.3FM)
"One of the standouts of the concert was the moving performance by Greg Thompson & Lesley Braithwaite as 'Swimming to Florida."
