The Song of Australia

Cover of the Marshall and Sons edition, ca. 1877
S.A. Typographical Society Eight Hour Celebration reprint of the poem by Caroline Carlton [sic], 1893

"The Song of Australia" was composed as the result of 1859 competition to create a "patriotic song", sponsored by the Gawler Institute in Adelaide. The winning lyrics were written by an English-born poet, Caroline Carleton, and the music chosen by the judges was composed by the German-born Carl Linger (1810-1862),[1] a prominent member of the Australian Forty-Eighters.

It was one of the options in the 1977 plebiscite to choose a new Australian National Anthem, in which it was preferred by South Australians, but lost in the other states to "Advance Australia Fair".

  1. ^ The original manuscript of Carl Linger's music for "Song of Australia" is held by State Records of South Australia, GRG 58/62/2