Some of Queensland’s finest female artists from a myriad of backgrounds will share BEMAC’s stage for the first time as a part of Queensland Women’s Week.
Featuring Melody Jettoo, Roz Pappalardo, Jackie Marshall, Toni Janke, Ruth Ghee and Sudha Manian, the repertoire will include some of their own songs as well as some unique collaborative pieces.
What can you tell us about your background and training as a musician? Is your cultural heritage important to the music you make?
Sudha: I started my training in Indian classical music and dance: sitar and Bhartnatyam at the age of nine with my Gurus in Hyderabad (India). It was a natural process for me to follow the footsteps of my older sister who was learning the same. I gave many stage performances, participated in various music and dance competitions and got my degree in dance and sitar in the course of my school and college days.
Sudha ManianIndian classical music is designed to create an appreciation for the rich, mythological, spiritual, cultural and artistic dimensions of Indian heritage. The 'Ragamala Paintings' stand as a classical example of the amalgamation of art, poetry and classical music in medieval India. Each 'Raag' has a mood, colour and depicts the story of a hero and heroine, season and the specific Hindu deities attached with the raga, and understanding this background helps me create my music.
Jackie: I first picked up a neighbour’s classical guitar when I was 14 and taught myself to play reading Bob Dylan songs from very basic lyric sheets, progressing very quickly to writing my own songs and developing my own, funny-vocal improvisation style.
These things became my passion, which eventually led to me auditioning for the Queensland Conservatorium’s Jazz programme: I was shocked to be granted entry as I was entirely self-taught and a life of making music seemed like an unknowable dream to me.
I come from a pragmatic family background with zero artistic culture; just a very average colonial sense of a cultured life being a moral one. I understand I was drawn to sing as I found the voice resonance therapeutic: I had a troubled childhood.
Now I look to the use of resonance and chant in other cultures’ music and I want to learn more about its purpose and power. Particularly I am hoping to find an Australian indigenous song-woman who will help me to learn about resonance in traditional songs and how they relate to their individual landscapes. I guess you could say my cultural heritage and its disconnect between art and life has propelled me to seek art in every moment. Art for me is a gateway to spiritual liberation.
Most of you are meeting for the first time. What are the challenges you are looking forward to, in collaborating over such a short space of time?
Sudha: Sue Krebs said: 'One of challenges of life is to become comfortable being uncomfortable as we move and expand into new experiences'. I believe music is versatile and look forward to working with very talented musicians with different influences. I hope we as a team get a wider exposure for our music, to use this project as a platform to try our core music styles in a different genre.
Jackie: While I don’t know the crew well yet (except Roz Pappalardo with who I’ve worked before) I’ve accrued much experience as a consulting musician and composer and this has taught me to be still and listen and feel the vibration of the people I’m working with, and to really listen keenly to what they are offering to the scene. I trust we will find our cosmic alliances by being open to each other, and important stories will bubble to the surface to be told.
I think the greatest challenge is to understand that while we cannot possibly know each other’s skill and brilliance intimately in such a short time, in order to create meaningful music with each other we must be open and willing to realise ideas through the lens of another person’s skill set and traditions. I hope to be a part of making red + blue = ultraviolet!
What do you hope to offer the audience?
Sudha: I hope to offer the audience a memorable evening with a musical experience that is quite distinctive. I hope they take away a pleasant realisation that a collaborative effort of varying musical styles can be just as enjoyable as their own particular favourites.
Jackie: I hope the audience will enjoy the spirit of camaraderie and cooperation that a diverse and brave ensemble such as this can present in their public performance. I hope the lesson of listening, and giving space for the other, is present in our performance. And I hope we write some ear-worms so that the experience will be even more memorable for the audience!
How is collaboration important to you as an artist?
Sudha: Collaborating with other musicians is very beneficial for me on a number of levels. It opens up new ideas, gives me an insight into different western styles of music, and expands my repertoire. Collaborating with jazz musicians in Australia has allowed me to explore how the characteristics of the Hindustani elements of Raag and Taal can be adopted to complement the structure and style of the new-jazz compositions. 'Music is the universal language of mankind' and collaborations with other artists allows me to express this through the sitar.
Jackie: Collaboration is how I learn: it is both inspiring and educating. It took me a long time to learn this. For ages I felt like I was diluting some kind of artistic ideal when I submitted to others. Now I understand that my ideals often lack multi-dimensional reality when there is no input from others. And that for ideals to grow and develop they need stimulation from an outside source.
It’s Queensland Women’s Week, and this is an all-woman project. What do you think projects like this hope to say to the public about women and the arts (if anything)?
Sudha: Queensland Women’s Week celebrates the social, economic, cultural and political achievement of women and BEMAC’s SingOut Sista! Women Of The World project is a celebration of this. 'More cuts to a diamond, the brighter it sparkles': and here we, six women with our diverse cultural backgrounds and beliefs stand together to shine as the brightest diamond to celebrate our past, present and the future through the universal language of music.
Jackie MarshallJackie: I live in a culture where women are still casually and insidiously subjugated and short-changed every day. Women from many other cultures and countries have it much worse. Celebrations such as this performance, nourish the female in us all and are a source of empowerment for all who participate, which feeds energy and empowerment back into communities.
SingOut Sista! Women Of The World takes place at BEMAC (Brisbane) 11 March.
