FAMILY, friends and colleagues are mourning the loss of Phil Moore, a Tamworth local and international journalist.
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Sadly, Mr Moore 62, died recently in Dubai where he had been based for 20 years.
Late last month, he was buried in his home town of Tamworth where he covered the city’s Country Music Festival for many years.
Colleagues and great mates of Mr Moore contacted The Leader and wished to pay tribute to their lost friend, who they said was revered in the Australian country music fraternity – from the stars, to the strugglers and Peel St buskers.
“Phil touched all our lives as a great mate, a terrific colleague ... and a character that Hollywood just could not invent,” Longtime mate and former journalist Gary Martin said.
”He was a loyal and dependable mate, and great, great company. Never a dull moment. He had a bottomless well of anecdotes and yarns that he could dredge up out of nowhere, and an opinion on just about everyone and everything – and a bloody strong one at that.”
Mr Martin described Mr Moore as a man of many opinions that were hard to shake.
Phil touched all our lives as a great mate, a terrific colleague ... and a character that Hollywood just could not invent,
- Gary Martin
For instance he could never quite come to terms that Russell Crowe had bought out his beloved South Sydney Rabbitohs.
“But we also saw Phil in a different light to most other people who knew him, hewas one of us, a journalist – and without doubt, one of the all-time best,” Mr Moore said.
“Some of us worked very closely with him on the Tamworth Country Music
Festival for seven years, and we could not count the stories he dug up that made it into newspapers and radio all over Australia ... due to his expert knowledge of country music, and affinity with all the musos.
“It must be said that Phil enjoyed a rare respect among the artists in the country music community, not least because he went out of his way to help the battlers and the strugglers and the new kids on the block by writing a story about them or offering his advice.”
“Phil will be remembered as a first-class journalist, the ultimate news professional, who gave so many artists – such as Adam Brand – their first big break at the Festival,” he said.