SUE Duncan was born on Tamborine Mountain.
Apart from living in Brisbane for five years at the age of just 15 when she left home to continue her education and find work, she has spent her life living here.
“In those days it was become a nurse, teacher or do secretarial work,” she said.
Sue started out as a shorthand typist and when she returned home worked as a private secretary for poet Judith Wright, as well continuing to work on her parent’s dairy farm, Seaview Farm, which remains in the family.
As one of three children and the only daughter, growing up on a farm was a tough existence living in poverty.
“There wasn’t money for ballet or music lessons. You didn’t have a meal out. I still can’t swim, there weren’t any swimming lessons,” she recalled.
Sue has been teaching people to play the piano for about 50 years.
Her love of music started at the age of three, despite the fact music didn’t exist in her house.
“Most of our life was work,” she said.
Their radio, with an intermittent signal, was only ever turned on to hear the news.
But she heard the hymns at church, the sounds of birds and the mechanical sounds of the milking machines and tractors.
“I just had it all inside me,” Sue said.
“I remember my dad saying, ‘Susie, come and see Norma’. Norma, (the neighbour’s daughter), came out with a mouth organ for both of us and I was so intrigued. She taught me this is a high note, and this is low note.”
One day her parents returned from Beaudesert with a tiny piano, which she still cherishes.
Then a local woman knocked on their door asking if Sue would teach her daughter to play the piano.
By this time, after four years of saving she had a full size piano, which she still uses for teaching, and she had paid for some lessons.
“I absolutely loved it, I didn’t think I could do such a thing, but I did,” she said of starting a career teaching.
Her cousin taught her how to read music and at eight-years-old she began playing the organ at one the Presbyterian churches.
Today she has two pianos, three organs, four or five accordions, two concertinas and some mouth organs.
One of the pump organs came over from England in about 1845 with the Gold Rush and was used to entertain the miners in the drinking halls.
Sue has been playing the organ for the Tamborine Mountain Remembrance Day Service for 15 years and the last five years she has been playing the old organ.
“It’s like a box of trumpets. It’s got the best sound I’ve heard. It’s an old-fashioned sound,” she said after they pulled it apart and restored it.
“It’s beautiful to play. I’m touching ivory keys made from elephant’s tusks.
“I teach the joy of music; all styles.”
Her students range in age from ten to 94-years-old.
“I love them all, I call them my musical family,” she laughed.
“I will teach until I pass on. I will go forever.”
