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AbstractHistoryArchive Description
'A living songbook more than four years in the making, Andrew Ford’s hymnal brings together the words of sixteen contemporary Australian writers – poets, essayists and folksingers – in songs of praise, awe, grief, hope, joy, and natural splendour, dedicated not to a god, but to the land.
'The ever-daring voices of Luminescence Chamber Singers join forces with two rising stars: Hilary Geddes, 2021 Freedman Jazz Fellow and lead guitarist of Triple J favourites The Buoys, and category-defying cellist Freya Schack-Arnott. Red Dirt Hymns unfolds to the evocative imagery of Sammy Hawker, whose art is created within the fabric of country itself: saltwater, limestone and eucalypt.
'From Ellen van Neerven’s dark clouds to John Kinsella’s abundant gardens, Red Dirt Hymns does what a hymnal is meant to do: it draws us closer – to each other, and to the light and shade of our wide brown land.'
Source: Canberra International Music Festival.
Notes
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According to Andrew Ford's website, the hymnal includes the following:
1. Gone (Jordie Albiston)
2. The New Summer (David McCooey)
3. Hymn of the Garden (John Kinsella)
4. dark cloud (Ellen van Neerven)
5. Isolation Hymn (Judith Bishop)
6. Rain Hymn (Judith Beveridge)
7. What Desire Knows (Sarah Holland-Batt)
8. Ultraviolet (Stephen Edgar)
9. Our Mother's Heart (Kate Fagan)
10. Between Birds (Merlinda Bobis)
11. To Whom Do We Sing? (Mark Wakely)
12. Respair (Felicity Plunkett)
13. This Is to You (Philip Harvey)
14. The Shape of a Vase (Erik Jensen)
15. Stand and Weep (Jill Jones)
16. Syreeni (Maria Takolander)
17. Looking for Corners (Melanie Horsnell)
18. Waiting for the Clouds (Martha Marlow)
19. My Octopus Teacher (Alison Flett)
20. South Golden Beach (Lisa Brockwell)
Numbers 5 and 8 were commissioned by Kim Williams. Number 7 was commissioned by Opera Queensland for its Young Artists Program. Number 15 was commissioned by Evergreeen Ensemble. Numbers 16 and 19 were commissioned by Luminescence Chamber Singers.
Source: https://www.andrewford.net.au/composition/red-dirt-hymns/ (Sighted: 22/07/2024)
Production Details
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Production postponed, but not initially cancelled, by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Presented as part of the Canberra International Music Festival at the National Museum of Australia, 2 May 2024.
