Black Arm Band

Last updated

Black Arm Band is an Aboriginal Australian and Torres Strait Islander music theatre organisation. [1]

Contents

History

The organisation was founded in late 2005 by Steven Richardson and has produced seven large-scale productions since its debut performance at the Melbourne Festival of the Arts in 2006 in addition to ongoing educational and development work in remote Aboriginal communities. [2] The organisation's name comes from a speech by former Australian prime minister John Howard, who referred to a "black armband view of history". [3]

Their first show, murundak (meaning "alive" in Woiwurrung), debuted at the 2006 Melbourne International Arts Festival and afterwards played around Australia and internationally in London. [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] Their second show, Hidden Republic, debuted at the 2008 Melbourne International Arts Festival. Both the 2006 and 2008 festivals were under the artistic direction of Kristy Edmunds. [9] [10]

In 2009 the new artistic director of the renamed Melbourne Festival, Brett Sheehy, continued the relationship with Black Arm Band.[ citation needed ] This saw the commissioning and presentation of the world premiere of Dirtsong, a piece of musical theatre conceived and directed by Steven Richardson, in 2009. With words written by Miles Franklin Award-winner Alexis Wright, Dirtsong, included both contemporary and traditional songs, and was a celebration of preservation of Indigenous languages. [11] The show was reprised for the 2014 Adelaide Festival, [12] [13] with performers including Trevor Jamieson (who was not in the 2009 version), Archie Roach, Lou Bennett, Emma Donovan, Paul Dempsey, and many other singers and musicians. Some of the songs were sung in Aboriginal languages. [14]

Seven Songs to Leave Behind (2010) was also conceived and directed by Richardson. Seven Songs was an international collaboration by contemporary Indigenous singers and musicians, including Gurrumul Yunupingu, joined by Sinéad O'Connor, John Cale, Rickie Lee Jones and Meshell Ndegeocello.[ citation needed ]

Notes From the Hard Road And Beyond (2011, also by Richardson) saw Mavis Staples, Joss Stone, Emmanuel Jal and Paul Dempsey join Black Arm Band to celebrate protest music from the 1960s through to contemporary Indigenous songs of activism.[ citation needed ]

Members

Members are drawn from around Australia and include both blackfella and white musicians with diverse musical backgrounds. [3]

Productions

Discography

Albums

TitleDetails
Murundak Live
Hidden Republic Live
(with The Melbourne Symphony Orchestra)
Dirtsong
(as The Black Arm Band Company)
  • Released: 2009
  • Label: MGM Distribution
  • Format: CD+DVD, DD

Awards

The Deadly Awards

The Deadly Awards, commonly known simply as The Deadlys, was an annual celebration of Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander achievement in music, sport, entertainment and community. The ran from 1995 to 2013.

YearNominee / workAwardResultRef.
Deadly Awards 2008 Black Arm BandBand of the YearWon [17]

Helpmann Awards

The Helpmann Awards is an awards show, celebrating live entertainment and performing arts in Australia, presented by industry group Live Performance Australia since 2001. [18] Note: 2020 and 2021 were cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

YearNominee / workAwardResultRef.
2010 Dirtsong (with Steven Richardson and Alexis Wright) Helpmann Award for Best New Australian Work Nominated [19]

Sidney Myer Performing Arts Awards

The Sidney Myer Performing Arts Awards commenced in 1984 and recognise outstanding achievements in dance, drama, comedy, music, opera, circus and puppetry.

YearNominee / workAwardResultRef.
2010Black Arm BandGroup Awardawarded [20]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Yothu Yindi</span> Australian musical group

Yothu Yindi are an Australian musical group with Aboriginal and balanda (non-Aboriginal) members, formed in 1986 as a merger of two bands formed in 1985 – a white rock group called the Swamp Jockeys, and an unnamed Aboriginal folk group consisting of Mandawuy Yunupingu, Witiyana Marika and Milkayngu Mununggur. The Aboriginal members came from Yolngu homelands near Yirrkala on the Gove Peninsula in Northern Territory's Arnhem Land. Founding members included Stuart Kellaway on bass guitar, Cal Williams on lead guitar, Andrew Belletty (drums), Witiyana Marika on manikay, bilma and dance, Milkayngu Mununggurr on yidaki (didgeridoo), Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu on keyboards, guitar and percussion, past lead singer Mandawuy Yunupingu and present Yirrnga Yunupingu on vocals and guitar. Manager

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mandawuy Yunupingu</span> Australian musician (1956–2013)

Mandawuy Djarrtjuntjun Yunupingu, formerly Tom Djambayang Bakamana Yunupingu; skin name Gudjuk; also known as Dr Yunupingu was an Australian musician and educator.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Archie Roach</span> Aboriginal Australian musician and elder (1956–2022)

Archibald William Roach was an Australian singer, songwriter and Aboriginal activist. Often referred to as "Uncle Archie", Roach was a Gunditjmara and Bundjalung elder who campaigned for the rights of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. His wife and musical partner was the singer Ruby Hunter (1955–2010).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Paul Dempsey</span> Australian musician

Paul Anthony Dempsey is an Australian musician. He is best known as the lead singer, guitarist and principal lyricist of rock group Something for Kate. Dempsey released his debut solo album, Everything Is True, on 20 August 2009, which peaked at No. 5 on the ARIA Albums Chart. He has also produced and co-written albums for other artists, including Mosman Alder.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bangarra Dance Theatre</span> Indigenous Australian dance company

Bangarra Dance Theatre is an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander dance company focused on contemporary dance. It was founded by African American dancer and choreographer Carole Y. Johnson, Gumbaynggirr man Rob Bryant, and South African-born Cheryl Stone. Stephen Page was artistic director from 1991 to 2021, with Frances Rings taking over in 2022.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Emma Donovan</span> Musical artist

Emma Donovan is an Aboriginal Australian singer and songwriter. She is a member of the renowned musical Donovan family. She started her singing career at age seven with her uncle's band, the Donovans. In 2000, she became a founding member of Stiff Gins, leaving the band three years later to release the solo album Changes in 2004. She performs with the Black Arm Band and released a solo EP, Ngaaraanga, in 2009.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ruby Hunter</span> Australian Aboriginal singer-songwriter

Ruby Charlotte Margaret Hunter, also known as Aunty Ruby, was an Aboriginal Australian singer, songwriter and guitarist, and the life and musical partner of Archie Roach.

Stephen George Page is an Australian choreographer, film director and former dancer. He is the current artistic director of the Bangarra Dance Theatre, an Indigenous Australian dance company. Page is descended from the Nunukul people and the Munaldjali of the Yugambeh people from southeast Queensland, Australia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Melbourne International Arts Festival</span>

Melbourne International Arts Festival, formerly Spoleto Festival Melbourne – Festival of the Three Worlds, then Melbourne International Festival of the Arts, becoming commonly known as Melbourne Festival, was a major international arts festival held in Melbourne, Australia, from 1986 to 2019. It was to be superseded by a new festival called Rising from 2020.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Arts in Australia</span> Overview of arts in Australia

The Arts in Australia refers to the visual arts, literature, performing arts and music in the area of, on the subject of, or by the people of the Commonwealth of Australia and its preceding Indigenous and colonial societies. Indigenous Australian art, music and story telling attaches to a 40–60,000-year heritage and continues to affect the broader arts and culture of Australia. During its early western history, Australia was a collection of British colonies, therefore, its literary, visual and theatrical traditions began with strong links to the broader traditions of English and Irish literature, British art and English and Celtic music. However, the works of Australian artists – including Indigenous as well as Anglo-Celtic and multicultural migrant Australians – has, since 1788, introduced the character of a new continent to the global arts scene – exploring such themes as Aboriginality, Australian landscape, migrant and national identity, distance from other Western nations and proximity to Asia, the complexities of urban living and the "beauty and the terror" of life in the Australian bush.

Alexis Wright is a Waanyi writer best known for winning the Miles Franklin Award for her 2006 novel Carpentaria and the 2018 Stella Prize for her "collective memoir" of Leigh Bruce "Tracker" Tilmouth.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu</span> Indigenous Australian musician

Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu, commonly known as Gurrumul and also referred to since his death as Dr G. Yunupingu, was an Aboriginal Australian musician of the Yolŋu peoples. A multi-instrumentalist, he played drums, keyboards, guitar and didgeridoo, but it was the clarity of his singing voice that attracted rave reviews. He sang stories of his land both in Yolŋu languages such as Gaalpu, Gumatj or Djambarrpuynu, a dialect related to Gumatj, and in English. Although his solo career brought him wider acclaim, he was also formerly a member of Yothu Yindi and later of Saltwater Band. He was the most commercially successful Aboriginal Australian musician at the time of his death. As of 2020, it is estimated that Yunupingu has sold half a million records globally.

Saltwater Band are an Indigenous roots band from Galiwin'ku on Elcho Island, around 560 kilometres from Darwin. The members are Yolngu and they sing mostly in Yolngu languages. Their songs are a mixture of traditional songs and reggae/ska influenced pop. One member of the band, the late Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu, is a close relative of Mandawuy Yunupingu of Yothu Yindi and was a past member of Yothu Yindi.

Lou Bennett is an Indigenous Australian musician, actor and academic researching Aboriginal languages and their retrieval.

Shellie Morris is an Indigenous Australian singer/songwriter who plays a mix of contemporary folk music and contemporary acoustic ballads.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Treaty (song)</span> 1991 single by Yothu Yindi

"Treaty" is a protest song by Australian musical group Yothu Yindi, which is made up of Aboriginal and balanda (non-Aboriginal) members. Released in June 1991, "Treaty" was the first song by a predominantly Aboriginal band to chart in Australia and was the first song partly in any Aboriginal Australian language to gain extensive international recognition, peaking at No. 6 on the Billboard Hot Dance Club Play singles charts. The song contains lyrics in Gumatj, one of the Yolngu Matha dialects and a language of the Yolngu people of Arnhem Land in northern Australia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Leah Flanagan</span> Musical artist

Leah Flanagan is an Australian singer-songwriter from Darwin, Northern Territory, currently based in Sydney. She has released two albums and has toured through Australia with her music and as a part of festival ensembles. She has also appeared on the Australian TV shows Spicks & Specks, Faboriginal and RocKwiz.

The 2011 Deadly Awards were hosted by Aaron Pedersen and Casey Donovan at the Sydney Opera House on 27 September 2011. Shellie Morris, the Yanyuwa Singers and the Gondwana National Indigenous Children's Choir all performed at the ceremony. The Awards program were broadcast on nationally on SBS TV in October. The event was an annual celebration of Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander achievement in music, sport, entertainment and community.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Trevor Jamieson</span> Australian actor, singer, dancer and playwright

Trevor Jamieson is an Aboriginal Australian stage and film actor, playwright, dancer, singer and didgeridoo player.

References

  1. ↑ "ATSIA". Australia Council. Australia Council.
  2. ↑ "About". Black Arm Band. TBAB Inc.
  3. 1 2 Donovan, Patrick (23 October 2008). "Yunupingu takes Black Arm Band message to the world". The Age . Retrieved 15 September 2010.
  4. ↑ Q Weekend Magazine. 12 July 2008 Solid Rock
  5. ↑ Evening Standard. 27 June 2008 Oz still has its wizards
  6. ↑ The West Australian. 25 February 2008 Perfect time to celebrate indigenous Oz
  7. ↑ X-Press Magazine. 21 February 2008 Murundak – The Black Armband
  8. ↑ The Sydney Morning Herald. 31 December 2007 Musical Journey to Aboriginal heart
  9. ↑ Melbourne International Arts Festival program The Black Arm Band. Hidden Republic Archived 16 September 2008 at the Wayback Machine
  10. ↑ The Age , 22 October 2008 Yunupingu takes Black Arm Band message to the world
  11. ↑ "Dirtsong". AustLit . 24 October 2009. Retrieved 19 October 2022.
  12. ↑ "Dirtsong" (audio). The Wire . 28 April 2016. Retrieved 19 October 2022.
  13. ↑ McDonald, Patrick (17 March 2014). "Adelaide Festival review 2014: Dirtsong – Black Arm Band". Adelaide Now .
  14. ↑ Johnson, Dash Taylor (16 March 2014). "Black Arm Band: dirtsong". InDaily . Retrieved 19 October 2022.
  15. ↑ "Productions". Black Arm Band. TBAB Inc. Retrieved 16 May 2018.
  16. ↑ History. "About". Black Arm Band. TBAB Inc.
  17. ↑ "Deadlys 2008 Winners Announced!". Vibe News. 8 October 2008. Archived from the original on 17 October 2008. Retrieved 10 October 2008.
  18. ↑ "Events & Programs". Live Performance Australia. Retrieved 4 October 2022.
  19. ↑ "2010 Helpmann Awards Nominees & Winners". Helpmann Awards. Australian Entertainment Industry Association (AEIA). Retrieved 8 October 2022.
  20. ↑ "The Black Arm Band receives top award". The Fred Hollows Foundation. 14 March 2020. Retrieved 23 March 2022.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.