Beau Dean Riley Smith (right) as Bennelong in Bangarra Dance Theatre's new production (photo by Edward Mulvihill) |
By Elissa Blake
Composer Steve Francis’ score for Bennelong, the latest work from Bangarra
Dance Theatre, owes a small debt to an obscure and long dead Welsh harpist.
Were it not for the quick thinking
of one Edward Jones, Francis explains, an extraordinary cross-cultural musical event
would have been forever lost to us.
In 1793, it was Edwards who notated
a traditional song sung by two young Aboriginal warriors, Bennelong and Yemmerrawanne,
in the London home of William Waterhouse, father of Lieutenant Henry
Waterhouse, who arrived in Sydney Cove with the First Fleet aboard HMS Sirius.
“We don’t know what Bennelong was
singing because the words were written down phonetically but at least we know
what it sounded like melodically,” says Francis, who has incorporated Edwards’
transcription in the score for Bennelong,
the Stephen Page-choreographed story of the life of the warrior, ambassador and
clan leader.
Francis is one of the busiest
composers in Australia’s dance and theatre scene. Sydney Theatre Company,
Belvoir, Griffin and Bell Shakespeare audiences have all experienced his work
but it is his artistic affiliation with Bangarra and with Stephen Page and his
brother composer David Page that is the strongest and longest lasting.
“I met Stephen and David something like
20 years ago,” Francis says. “Working with Bangarra was how I got into
composing for the theatre. The first ever play I did was Leah Purcell’s Box the Pony, and that only came about
because I met Leah through David. That led to working with David on Page 8, his one-man show at Belvoir and
through that, Belvoir offered me more sound design work. Eventually I moved
into composing.”
David Page died last year. His
musical and compositional influence on Bangarra and on Francis is profound.
“David really created a whole genre
in what he did for Bangarra,” Francis says. “The way he blended contemporary
music with traditional songs and instruments has been very influential for
people like me, and Paul Mac, and for many others he collaborated with. His
influence is always there whenever I write for Bangarra.”
Francis’ score for Bennelong is one of the most complex and
ambitious the composer has created. The audience will hear diverse elements,
ranging from Haydn’s Surprise Symphony (written the year before Bennelong went
to London) to recorded voices from the Aboriginal Tent Embassy, a salty old sea
shanty, fragments of Waltzing Matilda and a poetic rap spoken by actor and Cleverman star Hunter Page-Lochard.
Scoring for dance is quite
different to composing for the theatre, says Francis. “There’s no text or
actors’ voices you can hide behind,” he says. “But it’s also quite liberating for
a composer. I can be experimental, follow my gut and be fairly eclectic. In
Bennelong, each chapter has something instrumental or melodic that’s quite
individual to it but at the same time, it all has to feel like part of the same
show.”
Francis’ score also requires Bangarra’s
18 dancers to sing. It’s not an easy ask, says cast member Tara Gower. “Not
everyone felt confident, mostly because we use our breath very differently when
we’re moving,” she says. “We had to learn how to breathe for singing and moving
at the same time.”
Some of the vocals and language
words are from Murawi man Matthew Doyle while other elements of text and poetry
have been written by playwright and dramaturg Alana Valentine.
Music director Iain Grandage helped
the dancers find their voice. “He helped us work on a chant that is so powerful,”
Gower says. “It is really going to hit the audience like boom! People are going
to be knocked out.”
Bennelong opens at the Sydney Opera
House on June 29.
This story was first published in the Sydney Morning Herald on June 28, 2017.
This story was first published in the Sydney Morning Herald on June 28, 2017.
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