With more than 12,500km of coastline and covering 33% of the continent, Western Australia has long been home to a wonderful diversity of First Nations voices. This is music that takes us to the desert and the sea, music with a deep connection to country and is history.
Stephen Pigram's Walganyagarra buru, which translates to 'long time ago in coutry' narrates the journey of Pigram's great-grandmother Minybal Esther, who moved off her traditional lands into the shanty pearling camps of Rubibi (Broome). Guitar, string quartet and voice weave together, articulating both the upheaval of this move, and the ultimate meeting of Santiago, the father of Pigram's grandmother and family matriarch Petronella.
Elizabeth Sheppard is a Whadjuk Noongar composer whose music weaves narratives and connection with the area around Perth. Warangka Makialo combines a Yuat Noongar song called the Mikialo, transcribed by a Spanish missionary, with Sheppard's own contemporary psalm arrangement of the transcribed tune. Kalgoorli's Silky Pear explores her grandparents' experience of life in Kalgoorlie in the early 1900s, with the hardy, fire-resistant silky pear a native plant of the area.
