Robyn Doreian
Katie Noonan is best known for co-founding the ARIA award-winning group George with her brother, Tyrone. Here, the 49-year-old opens up on the important men in her life, including her ex-husband of 20-something years, and the pain she felt after the end of the relationship.
My paternal grandfather, Tommy, was a lovely fella. He was a vaudeville singing clown, and so I always had a clown at my birthday parties. He toured the Tivoli Circuit [Australian vaudeville empire] throughout the 1920s, ’30s and ’40s. To that end, he wasn’t a present father to my dad, Brian, who was sent to a Christian Brothers boarding school when he was five. Thankfully, Dad had a beautiful time there.
My maternal grandfather, Harry, grew up extremely poor during the Depression. He worked at the railyards from age nine, but went on to become a successful insurance salesman. He provided well for his five children, who all went to private schools. Both my grandfathers were war veterans and bore the scars that came with that.
Until Dad met my mum, Maggie, an opera singer, he was a little lost. He didn’t have that safety of a father to look up to and aspire to from the point of view of a career or parenting. He was a beautiful jazz singer and met Mum in 1968 on a TV show called Showcase. He was 12 years older than Mum. She had just graduated from the Queensland Conservatorium, where she’d received a full scholarship. Three weeks later, they were engaged – she was the love of his life. Being a musician, however, was an unreliable job, and so he moved to journalism to provide for his future family.
Dad worked very hard to support us and to allow Mum to pursue her operatic career. He was 90 when he died at home in Brisbane in March 2024. Dad had so much to be angry about – being misdiagnosed with Parkinson’s, the results of horrible medications he didn’t need, plus his loss of physical capacity from a stroke about 25 years ago – but he was incredibly peaceful. His last words were: “I love you, Maggie.” I’m quite convinced Dad’s up in the sky with his two best mates having a great time. He appears to me via rainbows, during big decision moments in my life.
My brother, Tyrone, is seven years older than me. When I was five, I was listening to Kylie Minogue. He was 12 and listening to Black Sabbath. I’d sing into my hairbrush, and he’d play a tennis racquet for a guitar. We formed the indie-rock group George in 1996 and got really close because of our joint love of music.
My first serious relationship was with Peter Nelson, a trumpet player in the band Taxi. We met while studying opera and jazz at the Queensland Conservatorium. He was a lovely fellow with a beautiful two-year-old son, Sam. We went out for a couple of years.
I was 20 when I had a brief, passionate affair with a Shakespearean actor. He was 14 years my senior – I’ve always gone out with older men as I’d found men my age to be a bit stupid. He was a beautiful man and he really did break my heart. Sadly, he died last year, which was far too young.
I met my ex-husband, Isaac Hurren, in 1996. We were friends before we became a couple. We got married in 2004 and had two sons: Dexter, in 2005, and Jonah in 2006. We travelled the world and had a gypsy life until the kids were at school and then moved to the Sunshine Coast, where Isaac was the stay-at-home dad. He was a beautiful, present male figure for them.
The first 20 years were great; the last six were pretty rough. COVID broke us, like so many couples. My dad died eight months before me and Isaac separated. I had watched my parents love each other until Dad’s last breath.
I cried all week as I packed up my life and left the marital home. I was incredibly lonely. My brother’s been incredibly supportive because he has been through a divorce – he understands the grief.
Despite all that has happened, ultimately it was the right decision for the two of us as individuals. So I’m actually grateful I’ve come to that place. But it’s taken a while.
Alone But All One by Katie Noonan is out now.
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