Musician Josh Pyke is best known for winning four ARIA Awards. Ahead, the 48-year-old talks about his close relationship with his mother – and losing her to Alzheimer’s – and how an encounter in a record store led to him marrying his wife, Sarah Tran.
My maternal grandmother, Madeline, and I were very close. I’d spend the night at her house in Strathfield, Sydney, with my sisters; she’d always make us hamburgers between white bread and we’d watch Young Talent Time before we went to bed. She was from a wealthy Queensland family and married my grandfather, Lew – an American GI who became an artist and writer. Together, they ran a screen-printing business. She was strict and firm, but very loving and very close to Mum.
Mum, who was born Catherine but went by the name Kate, sadly passed away 22 months ago. She had a long, awful battle with Alzheimer’s. When I was a kid, she was like a magical being to me, a beautiful singer who could play guitar and piano, and a great storyteller. She worked as a primary school teacher and then an ESL teacher later in life.
Mum was the first person I’d play my songs to in my early days, when I was living at home. On my recent album, the song Magic is a tribute to her.
Just before Mum passed, I played at the re-opening of the Balmain Power Station. In my childhood, it was an abandoned building that loomed large, just 200 metres from the house I grew up in. By the time it opened Mum was non-verbal, but was able to come in a wheelchair. It was amazing to have her there.
I was terrible with girls during high school. I was shy, nervous and had no confidence.
JOSH PYKE
Mum met my dad, Jon, at a party in Bondi in the 1970s. He’s from England and at the time he was working and figuring what to do with his life, so he stayed in Australia after they met. I have two sisters – Emma, 51, and Zoe, 47. We learnt how to sing rounds together with Mum, and often sang Red, Red Robin while doing the dishes.
As a teenager, I had a big crush on actress Claire Danes in the 1990s TV drama My So-Called Life. I also liked the main character from another TV show, The Press Gang. She was played by Julia Sawalha, who went on to be the daughter [Saffy] in Absolutely Fabulous.
I had a great teacher at Balmain Public School called Miss Northey, who I adored. She saw something in my creativity and told Mum I was really good at storytelling and tapping into my emotions. I still see her occasionally.
Another primary teacher, Miss Zavotosky, put me forward to be a character in the Schools Spectacular when I was in year 3. It was a really seminal moment, but I’d completely forgotten about until I was cleaning out my studio and came across some old school reports. She said my communication skills were really good.
I was terrible with girls during high school. I was shy, nervous and had no confidence. It was only after high school and at university that I started dating. There were a couple of really formative relationships that I learnt a lot from, but by the time I met my wife I’d been single for over a year.
I was 26 when I met my wife, Sarah Tran, in 2004. I was a struggling musician working in a record store and she was managing the bookstore across the road. She came in one day and ordered a Tom Waits CD. I recognised her because we’d been at the same high school, but she was a few years below me.
One night, we happened to be at the same party and I knew I needed to put myself out there. I felt there was something between us that I had to pursue. We dated for five years before we got married.
Sarah has influenced every single song I’ve written since we met. She is from a close-knit Vietnamese family; her mum is a strong matriarch, as are her sisters. We are all close. Sarah and I have two sons, aged 16 and 13.
Justine Clarke is one of the greatest women I’ve ever met, incredibly hard-working and an inspiration to me. We met as ambassadors for the Indigenous Literacy Foundation [ILF], wrote a song for the ILF together, and then did songs for a TV show. She’s a huge source of compassion and empathy. My sons had only ever seen Justine on Play School, and when she was working in my studio they couldn’t compute that the person from the television was at our house in real life.
Josh Pyke’s new album, Kingdom Within, is out now.
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Jane Rocca is a regular contributor to Sunday Life Magazine, Executive Style, The Age EG, columnist and features writer at Domain Review, Domain Living’s Personal Space page. She is a published author of four books.Connect via X or email.
