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Archie Roach – Artist of The Year 2010
Introduction
In the mid 1980s I saw Ernie Dingo acting in No Sugar, the powerful play by Jack Davis which explores the marginalisation of women and Aborigines in the Australian society of the twenties and thirties. I was ashamed and appalled by the play’s revelations, by the depth of our ignorance and cruelty. I met Ernie afterwards and apologised to him. He smiled broadly and shook my hand warmly. With typical generosity he welcomed me to his world. I felt a load lift from my heart. Ernie appeared at Port Fairy soon after, leading the way to these stages for many more fabulous Indigenous Australian artists.
Archie Roach first played at Port Fairy in 1991, just after Charcoal Lane was released, opening again the stories and emotions of the Stolen Generations as told by his song Took the Children Away. Archie is a wonderful artist noted for his moving songwriting and soulful singing, for his gentle spirit which rises above so much sadness. He is an inspiration, a peacemaker and true healer of the heart.
It is an honour to announce that Archie Roach is the Artist of The Year for 2010 and will be presented with a unique, hand-crafted Maton Guitar. Thank you Archie for giving so much through your courageous life of music.
Jamie McKew
Festival Director
Archie Roach – by Shane Howard
In the late 1980s, fellow musician Joe Geia invited me to a show he was doing at The Punters Club in Brunswick Street, Fitzroy. He said that I should get there early enough to see his supporting artists for the evening. I was living in North Queensland at the time but making regular visits to Melbourne recording, touring and visiting family.
When I got to the venue, the support artists had already commenced. I saw a man performing country and gospel songs with a voice like smoky honey. Sweet, but lived in. His name was Archie Roach. Performing alongside, as she nearly always has, was his lifelong partner, Ruby Hunter.
I met Archie that night. Joe introduced us. We observed a respectful formality. He was shy and not too much interested in talking a lot. Neither was I, but he had a quiet dignity that reminded me of many of the older Aboriginal men I had met in my travels around Australia. Shortly after, his nephew, Dave Arden, who I’d known from my Goanna days and his days in the band Koori Youth, joined Archie as his side man. Dave’s family, the Arden’s, were Gunditjmara people and he began to explain to me how Archie was connected to south west Victoria through his family connections to Kirrae Whurrong and Tjapwhurrong Country. I grew up outside Warrnambool in South West Victoria and knew of many of Archie’s relatives from that country.
Shortly after, Archie’s album Charcoal Lane was released and I was astounded not just by the quality of his voice, but the sublime depth of his songwriting. Like so many people, I was profoundly moved by his stories and his poetic gift to be able to tell those stories. I was in the audience at the ARIA Awards in Sydney in 1991 when Archie received his first music industry award for Best New Talent and Best Indigenous Album, for Charcoal Lane. Other than Coloured Stone, Archie was the first Indigenous artist to be awarded by ARIA. The following year, it was Yothu Yindi. I began to cross paths with Archie and Ruby more and more frequently. Sometimes through festivals and shows, sometimes at Framlingham for funerals or the handback of ancestral remains.
Once after the Port Fairy Folk Festival, in 1993, Archie and Ruby and I spent the afternoon with Auntie Alice Clarke and her family at Framlingham. There was much talk and laughter and at one point Auntie Alice got Archie to go and grab her some fresh gum leaves and she entertained us with tunes on the gumleaf.
I returned to live in south west Victoria in 1993 and it was the Aboriginal elder, Uncle Banjo Clarke, who helped me deeply reconnect with the Aboriginal history of my home country. It was Uncle Banjo who was instrumental in helping Archie reconnect with his birth country at Framlingham—his mother’s country. Ancestral country. Uncle Banjo was the conduit that enabled Archie to fit himself back into the life of the people and the country from where he had been stolen.
In the early 1990’s I was asked to produce a track for the Earth Music Trust and Archie and I recorded Jimmy Chi’s song, ‘Nhyul Nhyul Girl’ from the musical, Bran Nue Dae. I’ll never forget listening to Archie on the studio phone talking to Jimmy Chi in Broome, practicing the pronunciation of the Bardi Aboriginal language in the song.
Since then we’ve grown closer with the passing years. We were both born in the same town, in the same year, a few weeks apart. My father knew Archie’s Dad.
We’ve often talked about what might have been had Archie not been taken away from Framlingham as a child. We both spent time living near Kuranda in Far North Queensland when we were younger and have mutual friends from many of the families in that country. Over the years Archie and I have had many opportunities to talk and discuss all manner of things. Archie’s view of the world is deeply considered.
I was privileged to work with Archie on producing his Journey album in 2007. We then toured the album and the powerful, accompanying documentary, Liyarn Ngarn, nationally and to the UK and Ireland. Performing with the Black Arm Band on the banks of the Thames River, in London, from where the First Fleet left, provoked a great sense of irony. A week later, myself, Archie and Ruby, Bart Willoughby, Amy Saunders and Dave Arden flew into Ireland. As we landed, Archie said, “It’s good to be in your ancestral country, brother”.
We’ve toured together extensively with the Black Arm Band, from the capital cities to remote communities and what I can say of Archie is that he lives what he believes. I’ve observed how after shows people come to him with all manner of requests and compliments. Many are respected elders. Some are the people who he shared time with on the streets, back in those harsh years when he was trying to find his way back to his identity. He has time for everyone. Archie knows that fame is an illusion. He carries so many hopes and dreams for so many of his people. He’s one of their champions.
Many whitefellas also feel they can approach Archie because they’ve found a way, through Archie’s songs, to enter into a deeper understanding of the immensity of the suffering as well as the cultural richness of Aboriginal Australia. Many are already working in creative partnership with Aboriginal Australians. So many people draw strength and comfort from Archie’s songs. I do. Quiet and shy, Archie has seen the world from street level and concert stages and maybe because of that, he carries a quiet power that transcends words. A serious artist on a determined path and a man of exceptional perception about the human condition. He wants Aboriginal culture and spirituality to be fully appreciated and respected by the mainstream. He understands implicitly the great gift that Aboriginal philosophy has to offer.
Archie’s exceptional gift as a songwriter continues to grow. He’s carrying a lot of people’s stories and memories. He is a philosopher, a deeply honourable and an unrelenting and generous champion for his people. There are hundreds of stories I could tell about Archie and the depth of his humanity. His vision is immense. He has the generosity of spirit to incorporate settler culture into his world view.
Archie Roach, like so many Aboriginal people, has had to deal with much in his lifetime. Loss of childhood; loss of a meaningful relationship with his mother, from whom he was removed by authorities at the age of four; loss of family; loss of identity; loss of his country. He gave a voice to the stolen generations.
He carries the collective loss of his people, which is immense, on his broad shoulders. Sometimes you feel that the weight of that burden threatens to crush him. It would crush most people. But when Archie sings, he soars like an eagle and gives voice to all of that pain, suffering, loss, joy and inevitably, redemption. His great gift is that he does it in a way that liberates us all and we soar together. In 2009, Archie and Ruby shifted back to south west Victoria and we’re neighbours now, just out of Port Fairy, back in his mother’s country.
Shane Howard
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