"A Unique Collaboration Has Created An Authentic Form Of Australian Blues And Jazz"
It started at the Bondi Pavillion in1988, when Archie Roach sang PROUD PROUD WOMAN, until then, the men in Sydney who sang about femininity mostly performed in flambouyant frocks to like-minded punters at Kings Cross nightclubs. But Roach-who was accompanied by nine other Aboriginal men and his wife, the songs composer-had a serious point to make about the strength of Aboriginal women. Adding to the significance was that Hunter was the only female performer at the pavillion that night and it was her first time on stage. "We were being very positive and they loved it," she tells me over the phone from her home in Berri, South Australia, near her birthplace on the Murray River. She and Roach have been using music to challenge people's ideas ever since. Their latest effort is a CD of RUBY'S STORY the stage show they did with Paul Grabowsky and the Australian Art Orchestra in 2004 and 2005. it is one of the most optimistic and impressive CD's of the year, and should be compulsory listening for anyone who thinks reconciliation is about a "black armband view of history", or that Australian protest songs begin and end with folk-rock tunes played by conventional guitar bands. Grabowsky started talking to Roach about combining their talents in 2002. "Archie was ready to try something new at the time," Grabowsky says. "We decided to do Ruby's story with Archie as a co-star, partly because it's better to tell one persons story than two, and because Ruby is iconic for her generation." " She was born traditionally, raised traditionally , and a stolen child [at age eight], so she bridges the whole experience of that particular generation. And women have always been the custodians of the stories." Hunter, who suffers from a lung condition, was in hospital when she started writing her life story for Grabowsky to work from. Grabowsky says he felt privileged-Hunter wrote "reams and reams" of stories from her life. It was as if he had triggered something she had been waiting years to do. "I'd just never had time to think about it," Hunter recalls. "I was just after information but little did I know that it was forming a story of its own." As is the tradition, Hunter asked permission from her siblings, particularly her elder sister Iris, who had ensured the brothers and sisters stayed in touch while they were apart as children, to tell their stories. Her parents, she says, died young, of broken hearts. Roach and Hunter then started writing songs, recording them on cassette in their house, and sending them to Grabowsky. "Archie's songs were complete, like demos, but Ruby's were more like ideas." Grabowsky says. What followed was a rare and immensely enjoyable task for Grabowsky: to embelish the tunes with an array of styles-jazz, blues and gospel (created by other dipossessed people), and country, which is all about story telling. "He fulfilled them," says Hunter. "It was just beautiul, the way he did it. We discovered there was more when we saw an orchestra take up our music. It's different when you write for an orchestra, it makes you stop and think. There's a certain level of perfection that you have to have."Roach is more diverse than most people realise says Hunter. LITTLE BY LITTLE, one of the CD's best tracks, is a good example. It's a powereful blues melody, to which Grabowsky has added minimal percussion and violin at the start. It's about building a home "stone by stone", which Grabowsky reflects by adding more and more instruments. By the time Roach sings "Aint nobody gonna tear this building down", the power is palpable. "It was a matter of contextualising the songs and identifying the influences that came into their music." Grabowsky says. "In Ruby and Archie's musical lives, they've been exposed to various things, like gospel, country and blues, which have all played a role in the musical language they employ. I've broadened it by using a greater palette of intrumental colours and crafting arrangements that dramatise the songs."There were two songs that were already written which Grabowsky always intended to include in the show; Hunter's DOWN CITY STREETS , about her life as a homeless kid, and Roach's famous TOOK THE CHILDREN AWAY. Listening to the latter reveals, if there was ever any doubt, that the overarching philosophy of the project was optimism and positivity. "Archie's sung that song hundreds of times, but I think he got a new sense of what it's about when he heard the arrangement," says Grabowsky. It starts with a "march of hope", an almost cheeky militaristic drumbeat, and features a notably upbeat sax solo. "The importance of that song is that in the end the children come back,' says Grabowsky. "I've always thought of it as optimistic." "The story of their lives is a positive story. Both their lives are about hope. They met each other at a Salvation Army home, when they had been stripped of their identity and dignity, and built up their lives from that zero point. Now they've gone back to their ancestoral country and bought land there, and re-established themselves. It's also a great love story, about two people emerging from the darkness through trust in each other."They have since reached amazing heights with their music. Last year, the AAO was invited to perform it's version of Bach's ST MATHEW PASSION in Mexico City. Grabowsky asked Hunter and Roach to sing the chorale passages. "It was so special," Hunter says. "It was beautiful. I've never done anything like that. it's such a beautiful piece of music. It took us to another level. I was honoured." "Christianity was never a part of me, but I know about other religious beliefs. To me, culture is the spiritual thing. Just like Chrisianity is a spiritual thing. Everybody has their own spiritual convictions and beliefs. I don't bag them or anything because they've got to have something." Mexico got to see RUBY'S STORY, too. "We thought, 'Well, were here in Mexico, we may as well do it,'" recalls Grabowsky. So a performance was arranged at a university venue-with surtitiles for the Spanish speaking audience- and 3000 people turned up. "When your on tour, it's always difficult to know how well something is going down," says Grabowsky, "but at the end the 3000 people immediately rose as one and gave us a standing ovation. It was pretty thrilling." Which is cause for optimism when it comes to the CD. "It's great Australian music played at the highest level," says Grabowsky. "And it's about the most important issue of them all." "I just hope people will get good feelings from it-serentity." says Hunter. "Even though there's a lot of things that weren't good about those days, there were some things that were happy. You can make unhappiness where ever you are. But positivity pulls you through, and to be proud." Fred Pawle
- Limelight, April 2006
