Sweethearts play a score of years

Alex de Vos
Sweethearts’ founder and director Ross Lipson has fond memories of the band’s early days.
He notes the band’s performance at the 1996 Port Fairy Folk Festival as one of his most memorable.
“The festival director put us on before Christine Anu and the crowd just went off,” Mr Lipson said.
“They had to pull us off stage – we were having so much fun.”
Since then, the internationally acclaimed school band has ventured further afield, performing at festivals in Europe and the United States.
“We’ve had some fantastic experiences – we’ve been to Europe three times,” Mr Lipson said.
“It’s great for the students – they learn about teamwork and we have a lot of laughs.”
Based at Matthew Flinders Girls Secondary College, Mr Lipson formed the band in 1989 with a desire to expand the students’ musical repertoire.
“A group of staff and students wanted to play some music that was a bit different to the typical stuff we played in the school band,” he said.
“We wanted something with a bit of a jazz feel – something in the soul genre, then we applied it to classical sounds.”
After two decades, Sweethearts is “still going strong”, Mr Lipson said.
The director told the Independent he was looking forward to celebrating the group’s 20th anniversary next month.
“I can’t believe the band’s success,” he said.
“Over the years Sweethearts has recorded seven CDs and played more than 800 gigs.
“They’ve captivated audiences at the Lucerne Blues Festival and Parma Summer Festival and continue to be in high demand to appear at festivals and corporate events throughout Australia.