While the details of Australian composer Ron Grainer's music career in England are quite extensively described online link to rongrainer.org.uk Rons early life in Australia has always been something of a mystery.
There was one intriguing passing mention in a 1966 magazine interview about Ron building fences in the Australian outback for an uncle but few other clues have been given.
This chronology focuses on those previously unexamined years, looks at events in Ron’s family background and while only a basic outline obtained mainly from public domain sources such as historical newspaper articles it does reveal a number of quite surprising incidents and situations that make Ron’s later achievements appear all the more impressive.
Correction and expansion on the information collected here is welcome but if possible reference updates with as much source material detail as possible.
Because this history is more or less a pioneering effort subject to the revelations that usually appear after going public it should be regarded as only a working draft and not the final word on any of the topics covered.
When the end of "The European Years" section is reached hopefully any factual mistakes, late night typos, default text formatting problems and awkward sentences will have been corrected.
Please note that while part one of the blog concerns itself with the sometimes excessively wilful male side of the Ron Grainer family tree this is only because information on the maternal line is not currently available [to the writer of this blog anyhow].
The quiet achiever female side usually didn't make the papers [for better or for worse] in the dramatic manner of the three Austrian born Kreiner [later Grainer] brothers but they were obviously a harmonising and energy balancing influence that contributed greatly towards the recognition, development and maturing of Ron's music talents.
