GARMA FESTIVAL, 7-12 AUGUST 2003
Music Symposium
In 2003 the Garma music symposium will be a key feature of the Garma Forum, Dhuni:
Indigenous Art and Culture, running for 4 days from Saturday 9 August to Tuesday 12 inclusive.
 Garma opens on the afternoon of Friday August 8th with Clare Martin launching the Northern Territory Indigenous
Arts Strategy. The
primary focus of this year’s music symposium will be
the relationship between expressive media (song, dance and
visual design) in ceremonial contexts, where they are inextricably
linked with each other, and their commodified forms (for example
painting and sculpture produced for sale or exhibition, and
popular music CDs) which tends to break the intimate links
between the different media. A key question will be the extent
to which commodified products in different media are subject
to the same or different standards with regard to intellectual
property rights. In addition, the symposium will continue
to explore a number of themes established in last years forum,
in particular the significance and role of traditional song
and dance, the establishment of knowledge centres in local
communities, and the National Recording Project.
 The interconnectedness of the various expressive media in
Aboriginal ceremony has been extensively documented from the
perspective of ethnomusicology, dance ethnology and anthropology
(for example in Wild (1986) Ellis (1985), Morphy (1998). Issues
relating to the commodification of Aboriginal visual art have
also been well canvassed (for a summary see Johnson 2000)
and there have been some studies of commodification in the
context of popular music (for example Corn 2002; Stubington
and Dunbar-Hall 1994). There has, however, been relatively
less exploration of the relationship between commodified and
ceremonial forms of art and music (for examples of this sort
of work see Corn 2002, Morphy 1998, Stubington and Dunbar-Hall
1994).
The convenors of the symposium will be Mandawuy Yunupingu,
one of Australia's leading musicians with expertise and experience
in both ceremonial and commodified forms of music, Marcia
Langton Professor of Indigenous Studies at the University
of Melbourne and Allan Marett, a musicologist with broad research
interests in Aboriginal music who works at University of Sydney.
Following the highly successful series of presentations he
made to last year's symposium, Mandawuy Yunupingu has agreed
to present a number of sessions on his experience as a popular
musician, and the relationship of the music of Yothu Yindi
to traditional themes. In these presentations he will reflect
of the past and future of his band, Yothu Yindi.
The convenors of the symposium also invite presentations from
artists, musicians, dancers and scholars on the following
topics:
- the relationship between music, dance and visual design
in ceremony and the effects of commodification on the various
expressive media
- the role of song and dance in the exhibition or sale
of Aboriginal art
- the role and structure of knowledge centres and archives
in local Indigenous communities
- strategies for the establishment of a National Recording
Project
In addition to formal presentations, there will be a number
of open forums addressing the above themes.
When you send in your expression of interest to participate,
please register as a Garma Forum participant but indicate
that you will participate in the music symposium
For further information please contact
Aaron Corn (Symposium Secretary) at adscorn@hotmail.com,
or Allan Marett at allan.marett@music.usyd.edu.au.
References
- Corn, A. Dreamtime Wisdom: Modern-time Vision. Tradition and
Innovation in the Popular Band Music of Arnhem Land, Australia.
Ph.D. diss, Melbourne University, 2002.
- Ellis, C.J. Aboriginal Music: Education for Living. St. Lucia:
UQ Press, 1985.
Morphy, H. Aboriginal Art. London: Phaidon. 1998.
- Johnson, V. "Cultural brokerage: Commodification and
Intellectual Property", in Oxford Companion to Aboriginal
Art and Culture, 2000.
- Stubington J, and P. Dunbar-Hall. "Yothu Yindi's 'Treaty':
Ganma in Music", Popular Music 13(3): 243-59.
- Wild, S.A. Rom: An Aboriginal Ritual of Diplomacy. Canberra:
AIATSIS
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