Shadowing Practice: Graham Bonnet interview from Australia 1977 prior to joining Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow. - Learn English Speaking with Video

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well graham bonnet welcome to australia welcome to the yarrow river

and well thank you very much

we've picked a lovely day for it oh yeah yeah it is really good how are you feeling you

recouped yet no a few late nights

i've heard over the past few days slightly yeah a lot of late nights a lot of late nights well

you can get onto a um get to know about graham bonnet type conversation

because a lot of people really don't know all

that much about you it's it's mainly with uh it's all over now baby blue

that your your popularity and

and just general knowledge of you has started to happen in australia

but you're not really a newcomer are you not really no no

i used to be with a band called the marbles in about 68

and um my cousin who is a guy called trevor gordon used to be with the bgs over here

and we formed a band called the marbles uh barry gibb wrote the songs for us

we had a couple of hits over here and in new zealand i think yeah Yeah, yeah.

That ended after two years because my cousin didn't like the music business anymore.

So now he's a schoolteacher.

Well, at that stage too, you started looking at things other than the music industry as well.

Yeah, it didn't want me anymore.

It threw me out, music business.

So I was going to be a holiday camp.

That sounds bad, doesn't it?

Do you know Butlin's holiday camps?

Well, we've heard of the holiday camps from Carry On This and Carry On That.

Yeah, I was going to work on one of those as sort of an entertainer and whatever, you know.

I'm glad I didn't do it.

I'm glad.

Because I had a telegram from my manager.

His name is David Olly.

when i went home uh it's about uh two years ago i had this telegram from from david

and said what are you doing graham please get back into the music business

and so i came back here i am now you know you were experimenting for a certain

while with movies as well too i had a go yeah a film called three for all

which was a terrible film

it was a sort of a comedy thing uh like a cliff richard film gone wrong oh yes nice film

here comes summer holiday uh i like uh i liked it i liked uh doing a bit of acting

but it wasn't a very good film

you also got got off the um the james dean role in the movie too didn't you yeah

but that fell through for some reason

because uh they started drawing back uh james films on TV etc etc back home in England

I don't know why this was but for some reason it fell through

so I don't know what happened there

but maybe there's a thing next year another James Dean thing yeah we'll see about that

so you're still entertaining thoughts about about movies as well oh yeah oh yeah

I'd like to have a go yeah it's good fun

and not necessarily in a musical role no no no just straight yeah yeah

I suppose you would have been pretty surprised about the success

of the album in Australia compared to the rest of the world

I am very surprised i mean it didn't happen in england had a go

but it didn't quite happen but it's a nice surprise

and uh yesterday i got this uh gold thing presented to me on a show uh called countdown yeah

and that's great jesus what do you do with your flights here there's lots of them

compared to the rest of the you're sort of surprised

that it actually happened in australia before it happened

it happened here more anywhere you know this is it for me

you know what about an australian tour you've been thinking about

that at all yeah next may and i I hope to use the same guys I used on the album, if I can get them.

But they're very busy at the moment.

We have a date even, May the 5th, I think.

Is that a definite or...?

Well, I hope so.

You hope so?

I want to come back.

I really want to come back because it's a nice place.

In between now and then, obviously, there's more recording to be done.

Another album or what?

Yeah.

When I go back home, we start recording December the 5th on the new album.

I've got to listen to a lot of material when I get home, new songs, etc, etc, etc. etc and

that should be out early next year here well we should wait to see what happens when

that happens huh all right all right let's get back into

some more australian beer yes all right some english music graham thanks very much you're welcome thank you goodbye

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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson

This speaking lesson is built on the video “Graham Bonnet interview from Australia 1977 prior to joining Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow”. The speaker keeps coming back to these words: etc, film, happen, graham, holiday. This video has 72 sentences and 843 words to shadow. The speech runs for 4:18. The speaker talks fast, about 196 words per minute, so expect linked and reduced sounds. 84% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English; the rest is worth studying before you start.

Key vocabulary in this video

15 words from the video worth learning, with pronunciation and meaning:

Word	Pronunciation	Meaning
graham noun	/ɡɹæm/	Flour made by grinding wheat berries including the bran.
compare verb	/kəmˈpɛɚ/	To assess the similarities and differences between two or more things [“to compare X with Y”]. Having made the comparison of X with Y, one might have found it…
cousin noun	/ˈkʌz(ə)n/	Chiefly with a qualifying word: Any relation (especially a distant one) who is not a direct ancestor or descendant but part of a person's extended family; a…
dean noun	/diːn/	A senior official in a college or university, who may be in charge of a division or faculty (for example, the dean of science) or have some other advisory or…
marble noun	/ˈmɑɹ.bəl/	A metamorphic rock of crystalline limestone.
bind verb	/ˈbaɪ̯nd/	To tie; to confine by any ligature.
telegram noun	/ˈtɛləˌɡɹæm/	A message transmitted by telegraph.
necessarily adverb	/ˌnɛs.əˈsɛɹ.ə.li/	Inevitably; of necessity.
experiment noun	/ɪkˈspɛɹ.ə.mənt/	A test under controlled conditions made to either demonstrate a known truth, examine the validity of a hypothesis, or determine the efficacy or likelihood of…
goodbye	/ɡʊdˈbaɪ/	Farewell; a formula used to another person or persons when the speaker, writer, or person addressed is departing.
barry adjective	/ˈbɑɹ.i/	Traversed (transversely) by bars.
popularity noun	/ˌpɑ.pjəˈlæɹ.ə.ti/	The quality or state of being popular; especially, the state of being widely liked or in favor with the people at large.
cliff noun	/klɪf/	A vertical (or nearly vertical) rock face.
entertain verb	/ˌɛntəˈteɪn/	To amuse (someone); to engage the attention of agreeably.
definite adjective	/ˈdɛfɪnɪt/	Having distinct limits.

Phrasal verbs you will hear

Word	Pronunciation	Meaning
come back verb		To return to a place.
draw back verb	/dɹɔː ˈbæk/	to retreat from a position
fall through verb		To be unsuccessful, come to nothing; to be cancelled; not to proceed.
get off verb		To move from being on top of (something) to not being on top of it.
go back verb		To return to a place or state after having been there at a previous time.

Grammar in this video

The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:

Structure	In the video
“Used to” used to + verb — a past habit or state that is no longer true	used to be
Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now	we've picked · i've heard · has started
Verb + -ing enjoy, keep, stop… + -ing — verbs that are followed by the -ing form	started looking · started drawing · start recording

Pronunciation to watch

The speaker uses 25 contractions and reduced forms, such as didn't, you're, don't. Say them the short way, as you hear them.

Long words — get the stress right: necessarily /ˌnɛs.əˈsɛɹ.ə.li/, experiment /ɪkˈspɛɹ.ə.mənt/, popularity /ˌpɑ.pjəˈlæɹ.ə.ti/, entertainer /ˌɛntɚˈteɪnɚ/

How to practise with this video

Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
Start at 0.75× speed, shadow it sentence by sentence, then go back to normal speed once it feels easy.
Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like graham, compare, cousin.

What is the Shadowing Technique?

Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.

Shadowing technique: read the full step-by-step guide →

Shadowing Practice: Graham Bonnet interview from Australia 1977 prior to joining Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow. - Learn English Speaking with Video

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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson

Key vocabulary in this video

Phrasal verbs you will hear

Grammar in this video

Pronunciation to watch

How to practise with this video

What is the Shadowing Technique?