Xmas 2024

At the beginning of 2024 I was down at Casey Station in Antarctica with K Deverell recording material for our new multi-art installation.  It tells of the utter vastness and beauty of the continent that contains 90% of the world’s ice. It addresses the massive climate story and the repercussions of continuing to burn fossil fuels. It is uncomfortably stunning.

Next week, K and I head to Monash University Performing Arts Centre for a week in residence to work the film sounds and compositions in surround vision and audio.

Alongside the film art installation, I am working on an album of Antarctica soundscapes songs and material sourced from my compositions recorded on teh RVS Nuyina and observations down past the 60th parallel.

Following on from the 8 weeks in Antarctica, in a year of important projects, I travelled with the Wantok Musik team to Timor Leste (Hamoris Lian Timor-Reviving the Sounds of Timor) and Bougainville (Lek Mak-Footprint) to record ancestral and contemporary songs and stories with musicians in each country.  Both have experienced devastating wars in the two decades before the year 2000 and both are situated in our immediate region. Was heartening to see people fighting back from dire situations and the hunger the artists had for opportunity to record their songs and stories.

Thanks to Music Australia I travelled to Manchester for Womex, speaking with festivals and art centres about Wantok projects and those of my own. Manchester has a bit of Melbourne about it, trams and Victoria era museum and libraries, damn cool record stories (I even bought a original vinyl copy of Joy Division’s Closer to mark the occasion), though after 11pm I can see where the term Manchester comes from.

In August, Christine Anu released Waku which I was proud to have produced & co-written, & it was great to see it nominated for ARIA & NIMA awards. The album is based upon Saibai Island songs and stories of Christine’s grandfather Andhele and her sadly recently departed mother Zipporah. Having produced her Stylin Up album back in 1995 it was wonderful to reconnect my friendship with Christine and follow through on a uniquely Torres Strait Zenadh Kes sound.  

Thanks to everyone who came to my shows this year - at Wauchope, The Wheaty, Four Winds, State Library of NSW, Avoca, Creswick, Blue Mountains Fest, Birds Basement, Peninsula Hot Springs, Cobargo Fest, National Folk Fest and Smiths Alternative Canberra.

Look out for “Killjoy” on Stan - a powerful story that I composed the music for with the help of Helen Mountfort.  About 70 minutes of piano and cello music there; & coming next year is “Journey Home (NITV) a feature documentary on the funeral of Mr Gulpilil.

A big highlight for me is the finishing of my new “Mearang Leurpeen” studio down at the Donkey Shed at Krambruk(Apollo Bay) which translates as “meeting house for song”. It’s a big open plan studio with views to the Otway National Park. The occupational hazard being keeping the rooster, donkey and koala noise down to a bare minimum and my Kooli dog Betty to stop singing backing vocals every time I try to put down a vocal. The sound and feel of the studio seems to have struck the right balance acoustically thus far,  though Ive only been in it two months.

In the first half of next year I will release on vinyl and digital an album of piano and vocal songs entitled “On Karen’s Piano”. A collection of NDW, Cake and solo songs re recorded on a wonderful old Polish grand piano which was owned by a friend of mine who sadly passed away. The album is in honour of Karen and her partner Peter. We brought in a range of microphones and set up a studio int he living room of the suburban house and recorded 35 songs over two days and have selected the best sixteen.

Thanks everyone for your support as always. It means a great deal to me. Keep safe both on the road and in your head during the end of year months. And after the devastation of Gaza and the Trump election - with anti vaxxers and climate change denialists in positions of impact - my take is to concentrate and support important projects that are counter to that take on the world. Social Justice approaches are always worthwhile. Losing yourself in music or a good book aint bad therapy either. And of course head out into the natural world!

Have been loving Laurie Anderson’s Amelia Earhart diaries album and thoroughly recommend Radical Son’s Bilambiyal album if you haven't come across it yet.

Hope to see some of you at the Xmas show with Rosie at the church in Birregurra on Sat 14th December

“Thinking means that each time you are confronted with some difficulty in life you have to make up your mind anew” Hannah Arendt

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