Roots/alt. country duo The Yearlings combine warm boy-girl harmonies, delicate flat-picking and sparse country blues to create songs that are at once haunting and soothing.

Live it’s two people (a couple) on a stage surrounded by acoustic guitars, playing songs, telling stories and letting you into their world for an hour or so - a living, breathing affair of the heartstrings with inspired rhythm and traditional flattop picking cradling keen melodies.

Robyn Chalklen and Chris Parkinson have wasted no time in getting down to the business of making music since meeting at the Tamworth Country Music Festival in 2000. Their successful self-titled debut album (released on Reckless Records in 2003) was recorded live in 8 hours and long-listed for an ARIA nomination.

The Yearlings joined the ranks of the great duos of alt. country/roots music with their sophomore album Wind Already Blown (Mixmasters Records), the trademark skeletally sweet harmonies and sparse but alive playing blow a spring breeze through faded black and white photographs over 13 original tracks. Two tracks from this album were chosen for Claudia Karvan’s award-winning television series, ‘Love My Way’.

With the release of their third full-length recording, Highway Dancing, including eleven new songs the Yearlings have created an album of outstanding beauty. It breathes.

Highway Dancing is a departure from The Yearlings’ stripped back, acoustic approach to recording. Using their weaving guitars and seductive harmonies as a base, this album has the backing of a band – giving full favour to The Yearlings’ music.

The Yearlings performed at the prestigious New York Guitar Festival in February 2008 sharing the bill with Teddy Thompson, Jim Lauderdale and Ollabelle. After which they stayed on in New York to make their third album.

What people are saying:

“This is music that could have been written and sung 80 years ago or put down on tape yesterday. It feels weathered and lived through, yet anything but stale...”
—Sydney Morning Herald

“Here’s a duet in perfect balance with their original and personal songs...The Yearlings wave intimate lyrics and harmony around each other until songs gain altitude and float off...”
—3DFM

“The Yearlings express the lyrical truth of storylines about real life that poetically tug at the heartstrings...”
—Jimmy Little

“I have been ‘hanging out’ for another one to play. I have a belief in this band and want to share their music with Australia.”
—John Nutting, ABC Radio National Magazine

"If The Yearlings' debut was promising, this album marks them out as something special." Bernard Zuel, Sydney Morning Herald

"Another collection of heartfelt songs that is utterly charming and horribly irresistible." Tom Jellett, Weekend Australian

"The intimacy, authenticity and joy... lift this album... into its own, transcendent realm. Sophie Bert, The Age

"Bony guitars, tales of bloody suicide and lost friends, all Imbued with harmonies to turn your spinal fluid Into Ice water. Sparse, spectral and spectacular, this album will reduce the hardest heart to ashes." Jason Walker, Juice Magazine

"Consider me a fan. Bands like this dont come along every day, but bless 'em when they do." Rip it Up Magazine

"Like all the best lonesome songs, from Foster down to Tonnes Van Zandt, in the end it leaves you feeling you aren't so alone In the world after all." Noel Mangel, Dally Telegraph

"This Is an extremely well thought out album, full of first-rate songs that read as well on the page as they caress the ear. It's an exercise In restraint and nuance that still excites. Most Importantly, It's got soul." Joe Bonanno, 3CR Radio, Melbourne