By Casey Neill
Always be kind was Guy Sebastian’s top advice to Dandenong Primary students.
The chart-topping singer popped into the school on Monday 18 June ahead of two shows at the Drum Theatre in Dandenong.
“What’s the most important thing in the world?” he asked before leaving.
“Kindness,” the students responded with gusto, clearly taking the tip on board.
He said they shouldn’t react to someone being mean by being mean in return, likening that response to trying to put out a fire with fire.
“People are people. Everyone’s the same,” he said.
“Everyone deserves the same love.”
Guy started his visit by surprising a Grade 6 class, before school captains Rida and Hamza escorted him to the school hall.
“It’s very different, in a good way,” Rida said.
She said her favourite Guy Sebastian song was Like a Drum, and he later performed an acoustic rendition of the track along with Battle scars and Like it like that.
Hamza said he was nervous about meeting Guy, and very surprised to see him at the school.
“I’m happy to meet him,” he said.
Students in the packed hall asked question after question to an obliging Guy.
He answered each one with a witty retort and plenty of warmth.
He told them his favourite colour was green, his favourite performance was his appearance on US talk show David Letterman, and that even simple, day-to-day sounds could set his song-writing creativity in motion.
Students asked him how he learnt to sing and he explained that he taught himself by listening to the radio and trying to mimic his favourite artists.
“I used to do that for eight hours,” he said.
Guy posed for dozens of selfies and signed countless autographs for students, staff and parents before his whirlwind school visit came to an end.
