Adelaide Fringe has announced the centre piece work for Adelaide Fringe’s 2022 program Sky Song.
A collaboration between First Nations artists and drone art specialists Celestial, Sky Song combines state-of-the-art technology with ancient songlines and storytelling.
The monumental performance artwork is presented by Gluttony and will take place at the Adelaide Showgrounds over 31 nights from February 18 to March 20, 2022.
Sky Song creates a profoundly emotional experience through a powerful marriage of old and new – it reawakens a remembering that we are all bound by universal wisdom.
The Sky Song performance will feature a swarm of hundreds of drones flying in majestic formation above a colossal 60m wide screen projection.
It’s a dramatic haze and lighting, hyperreal sound, poetry, iconic anthems and newly commissioned music to tell the stories of First Nations artists on the ground and in the night sky, high above Adelaide.
Narrated by singer, songwriter and tireless campaigner for the rights of Indigenous Australians, the iconic Archie Roach, Sky Song will unfold over five chapters.
Archie Roach Image credit: Adrian Cook
It will focus on topics such as belonging and connection to country, ancestry, the passing on of knowledge, creation stories, land rights, the devastation of the stolen generations and the hopefulness of reconciliation.
SKY SONG features a soundtrack of the work of many of the country’s most acclaimed First Nations artists including cultural icons Archie Roach and Kev Carmody. It will also include celebrated musicians Electric Fields, Iwiri Choir and Nancy Bates; storytellers Major ‘Moogy’ Sumner and Jack Buckskin; poet Ali Cobby Eckermann; dance group Dusty Feet Mob and visual art by Electric Fields’ Zaachariaha.
Electric Fields
Alongside beloved songs such as Roach’s “Took The Children Away’” and the Kev Carmody/Paul Kelly classic “From Little Things Big Things Grow”, Sky Song will also include a new work from Iwiri Choir and a brand new song by electronic duo Electric Fields called “Ngura”.
Alongside beloved songs such as Roach’s “Took The Children Away’” and the Kev Carmody/Paul Kelly classic “From Little Things Big Things Grow”, SKY SONG will also include a new work from Iwiri Choir and a brand new song by electronic duo Electric Fields called “Ngura”.
Electric Fields’ Zaachariaha Fielding said Ngura is about the beginning of all things, the embodiment, the essence, the internal and the external.
“You find ngura everywhere. I have ngura in you, you have ngura in me,“ Zaachariaha said.
Sky Song Soundtrack Supervisor, Nancy Bates said the more Australia takes time to listen to our First Nations stories, the richer we become.
“Rich in our humanity, rich in a way that gives to the world, and not in a way that takes from her,” Nancy said.
Sky Song represents the continuation of enduring peoples and enduring wisdom. As light drones dance to interwoven stories, powerful voices will elevate the very consciousness of those gathered together for this experience.
These artists’ stories, music and visuals will be showcased in phenomenal scale by Celestial, drone artists that specialise in fusing culture and technology to create multi-sensory spectacle. Celestial have created major cultural moments for Greenpeace, Amnesty International and Edinburgh’s Hogmanay New Year to name a few.
Sky Song is a part of Adelaide Fringe Festival 2022
It will take place at Adelaide Showgrounds, Kaurna Land (Adelaide) from February 18 – March 20, 2022.
Tickets are $15 – $25 and are on sale at adelaidefringe.com.au.
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