Cassar-Daley shifts focus to Freedom Ride

This year a lot of attention will be given to the centenary of the ANZAC landings at Gallipoli.

But country music star Troy Cassar-Daley wants to shed light on another significant moment in Australia's history - the Freedom Ride of 1965.

During the Freedom Ride, Aboriginal activist Charles Perkins and a group of students travelled into NSW country towns on a bus protesting for Aboriginal rights.

The Freedom Ride generated huge publicity at the time and exposed the racial segregation and discrimination suffered by Aboriginal people.

Two years later, a referendum on Aboriginal rights was held and was successful, leading to amendments made to the Australian constitution.

The amendments allowed Aboriginal people to be included in the national census and formally recognised them as Australian citizens.

"Freedom Ride was a special thing for me as an indigenous kid ... such an important issue and an important happening in indigenous history," Cassar-Daley told AAP.

The singer says he was blown away to learn as a kid that before the Freedom Ride indigenous Australians, including his own grandparents, couldn't vote.

"I was blown away with that. I didn't think that could happen in Australia. I didn't think there was segregation in Australia."

Now, 50 years later, Cassar-Daley is putting the story back out there, front and centre, with his ninth record titled Freedom Ride. It's a timely decision.

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Cassar-Daley shifts focus to Freedom Ride

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