Bones of Contention

“They call me Bonesy,” says John Hill, with a chuckle.

“I don’t want to brag about it but apparently, I’m the world champion bones player.”

In 2003, John got his twenty seconds of fame and acclaim…. before it all came crashing down in a clash of egos, international calls and dubious competing claims.

Pulling out a pair of bones from a leather pouch, small, slightly curved and made from the rib bones of a long-departed bullock, John demonstrates his distinctive style.

“You hold the top one and the bottom one loose,” he demonstrates, with a wrist twist. “It’s all rhythm.”

“When I was a young tacker, my dad was in a minstrel group in Yahl and he played bones. Me and my mate used to sneak up the Yahl Hall and watch the Bill Case Band.”

John was 63 and had been playing the bones for near on five decades when opportunity knocked – an invitation to compete at the Spoon & Harmonica World Titles at Surfers Paradise in 2003.

It would be fair to say it was a competition for those on the fringes of the music world.

Major sponsors included Fast Eddies Pies and the Sav Soup Cart.

“One bloke had a big carrot hollowed out and had a piece of celery, making music from that, all these weird and wonderful things.”

There was bird callers, gum leaf players, yodellers and then there was John Hill, with his bones competing against just two other men.

“The bloke from Hervey Bay had me worried, he thought he had it in the bag,” John declares.

Five heats later and with a grand final beckoning, a nervous John pulled out all the stops to nail his performance.

Late night practice sessions ensued in front of a mirror, his arms furiously flying away, bones clacking and sweat dripping as he worked to put a showman element in his performance.

“If you muck up a beat, you’ve had it.”

In front of the judges and an appreciative crowd, John, clad in a white silk shirt with black fringe which danced every time he shook his arms, launched into his performance and ended with a flourish.

He’d nailed it.

Awarded the World Hillbilly Bones Champion and Most Outstanding Artist trophy by a friendly Gold Coast Meter Maid in a shimmering gold bikini, a chuffed John got on the road home.

He arrived home to a hero’s reception, in hot demand by all.

“I was on the ABC and the Border Watch rang me up and even the Mayor sent me a letter. I thought, ‘oh gosh, strike me pink!”

“I said to a mate of mine, “it’s all a bit much, this world champion business.”

But it didn’t take long for the word of the new world champion to spread and feathers in the niche music world of bones-playing to be ruffled.

Having breakfast one morning two weeks later, John had his toast and Vegemite interrupted by a phone call.

In a strong American drawl, he was drilled, “is that John Hill from Mount Gambier in South Australia?”

 Confessing he was, John was drilled about his latest title.

“He said to me, ‘what’s all this I hear about some world champion business? You know I’m the world champion over here’.”

John admits he was a bit ruffled by the news but they finished on a promise that John would travel overseas to compete and the friendly argument would be sorted for once and for all.

It never eventuated and in 2019, he was usurped.

Barry Patton from Ireland was named the new World Champion bones player.

John is philosophical about the loss of his title, good humoured

Now 81, he pulls the bones out every once so often, ‘as the occasion arises’.

It still feels natural and he’s still got his sense of humour about it all.

 “If I run out of bones,” he says with a glint in his eye, “well my place backs onto the Lake Terrace East Cemetery…”