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Slim Dusty
Biography
Slim Dusty was the most prolific and biggest-selling recording artist in Australia, with more than five million of his recordings sold on the domestic market of 20 million people and a status akin to the all-time greats in country music. In 2000, the 73-year-old Australian music legend released his 100th album.

He was born David Gordon Kirpatrick in Kempsey, NSW, Australia, and spent most of his younger days at a dairy farm. The first major influence on his career in music was his father, who liked to vocalize to the accompaniment of his fiddle playing when Kirpatrick was still a toddler. The event that changed his life forever took place when he was ten and heard an aborigine sing a song called "The Drunkard's Child." He was so fascinated, that same year he wrote his first song, "The Way the Cowboy Died." At age 11, he decided to rename himself Slim Dusty. In 1942, as a "seasoned performer" of 15, Slim talked his way into the studios of the local radio station, and at his own expense recorded two songs: "Song for the Aussies" and "My Final Song." He became a regular performer and in 1945 wrote his first classic, "When the Rain Tumbles Down in July.
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