The Sounds of Aurora Australis: A History of Australia’s Musical Identity

Entrenched until recently in Western aesthetics, Australian composers are now developing a functional cultural "identity" expressed through a distinctly nationalistic musical idiom. Its ongoing formation, inspired by Australia's Aboriginal heritage and unique natural environment, seeks to distance the nation's artistic developments from the geographically remote Occidental regions and emphasize its "native" cultures. Presently, however, mounting sociopolitical and ethical concerns surrounding the cultural "borrowing" between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples are problematizing the developing nationalistic idiom, as composers must determine whether the two groups share any legitimate connection beyond mere occupation of the same land, given their tense post-colonial history. Musicologist Beatrice Dalov traces the formation of the Southern Land's cultural identity while simultaneously considering its complex relationship with the nation's First Peoples. She illuminates the origins, influences, and developments of Australian "art" music, from colonization (late eighteenth century) to the present day, interweaving the social, cultural, political, and economic forces that shaped (and often determined) its evolution. The history demonstrates that the complex processes of articulating a unique cultural identity began almost immediately after arrival of the first colonists and continues uninterrupted through today. Drawing on newly available archival material, key works, and personally conducted interviews with numerous contemporary composers, Dalov traces the history of the land's music, from scattered convict settlements and eventful contacts with Aboriginal peoples, to the formation of a national musical infrastructure, to today's thriving musical independence. She brings forward not only the most prominent composers and musicians of the last century, but also those who laid a crucial foundation and offered the first contributions toward a national idiom. A history of the music of the Great Southern Land has been too long neglected by social historians and musicologists worldwide. Beatrice Dalov sets the record straight.