Starting tomorrow night (Tuesday August 19) on ABC, The War That Changed Us is a dramatised four-part documentary series to mark the centenary of the First World War.

This ambitious production reveals the epic story of Australia and the Great War through the lives of six Australians: a foot soldier, a General, a nurse, a militant anti-war activist, a peace campaigner and a pro-war crusader. The evocative theme song for the series, “The Distant Call of Home”, was written by Marita Dyson and Stuart Flanagan of Melbourne band The Orbweavers.

The Orbweavers agree that working on The War That Changed Us; learning and recording traditional World War I songs for the soundtrack, and then writing an original theme song, was an extraordinary experience for them as musicians.  “To write the theme song, we searched for a connection between people of the past, who experienced the war, and the present”, Stuart Flanagan said.
 
‘Themes of time and distance became our focus”, explained Marita Dyson. “We thought about the rising of the sun in Australia signalling nightfall in trenches across the other side of the world; the sun as a link between people and places, thousands of miles apart.
 
“We stood at the gate of our house and looked down the street, imagining what family or a loved one would have felt in the same place, 100 years ago, waiting for news”, Dyson remembered.”We thought about the Australian landscape of home, the sound and light – a tangible environment across time.”

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