Listening to :

The beauty of Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu’s songs on his solo album moves me to tears. His strong, high voice soars so smoothly.
In Gurrumul History (I Was Born Blind) his singing reminds me of the intense sweetness of Antony Hegarty of Antony and the Johnsons.
Watch and listen to I Was Born Blind.



Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu is from North East Arnhem Land, blind since birth, he plays,uniquely, right-hand strung guitars left-handed. He was formerly in Yothu Yindi and is now a member of Saltwater Band. The slow pace of most of the songs invokes a calm, contemplative mood.
In the moderate reggae/rock of Saltwater Band's Marwurrumburr, a song about a wild cat, Gurrumul's studio version on this album renders the language almost onomatopoeiac. His songs are in three Indigenous languages and sometimes in English.



The album is produced by Skinny Fish music
in Winnelli in the Northern Territory.

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On her blog Mutually Said, Tracy Ryan writes about a recent production of Jacques Brel Is Alive And Well And Living in Paris and about her re-energised love for Jacques Brel’s music and performance. Read Tracy Ryan’s poem ‘Watching Brel' in the soon-to-be-completed next issue of Jacket magazine.

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            The Giramondo Publishing Company
             warmly invites you
             to the launch of a new poetry collection
             by Alan Wearne



                 to be launched by
                 Pam Brown
                 on Sunday 20 April
                 3.30 pm
                 Gleebooks
                 49 Glebe Point Road,
                 Glebe Sydney
                 RSVP: 02 9660 2333

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John Mateer's new book of poems
has been published by Salt Publishing
Here's a poem from Elsewhere:

Takbiran

There is a night when all radios transmit like minarets,
when the chanting of engines and firecrackers
is as comprehensive as the space in any loved room.

It's the night when windows tremble like the walls of Jericho,
when unbelievers acquiesce to the silence of their wide-screen TVs.

That night is stalked by a fasting moon and its thirsty day,
and with vibrato and reverb is everywhere breeding voices
like engineered wheat or a mirage in an Arabian desert.

That night is pursued by the single-eyed sun who squints
at the field of newspapers where families have knelt,
and squints again at them on scooters speeding to their ancestors.

On that night all is awake to the sound of the one Name.

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Publisher's blurb : Presenting John Mateer’s poems about South Africa, Sumatra, Japan, the United States and Mexico, Elsewhere is an exciting introduction to a poet whose work has been receiving international attention for the past decade. Elsewhere is a vision of today’s world, a moral accounting of the history of the past five hundred years of Western colonization in one person’s experience.


Main description: Presenting work that John Mateer has previously published in South Africa, Australia, Indonesia and Japan, Elsewhere is an introduction to a poet whose work has been steadily receiving international attention over the past decade.

Elsewhere is divided into three sections: “Azania”, “Medan and Zipangu” and “Americas”.

The poems of “Azania” describe the poet’s memories of South Africa and his impressions when he has revisited the land of his birth, encountering animals, ghosts, Zulu and Maori poets, goldminers, gambling ‘madams’ and the urban ruins left in the wake of immigration.

“Medan and Zipangu” contain work written and published in Sumatra and Japan. More metaphysical than the South African poems, these poems capture the spiritual turmoil of one who finds in the act of encounter the means of undoing the psychic violence of the past. Sensual and detailed, they are steps towards the healing of a traumatized psyche, the rebirth of a wandering ghost.

The section concluding the book, “Americas”, reframes Mateer’s world through reference to those other New Worlds that are actually Old Worlds: the United States and Mexico. More ironic than any of his other work, these poems are pointed and political – one about Ground Zero, another about a Slovene poet who, with the poet, seeks out a shrine dedicated to Saint Death – and some with a deft sense of humour and surprisingly sexiness.

Elsewhere will be launched in Melbourne by
Kris Hemensley
Wednesday, 2nd April, 2008
6.00 for 6.30pm
Collected Works Bookshop
Level 1,
Nicholas Building
37 Swanston Street,
Melbourne
RSVP to Natalie: marketing@inbooks.com.au

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listening to



Wendy Saddington live in concert at radio 2 DoubleJay
in Sydney in 1976 on audio cassette.



Wendy Saddington and The Copperwine on 33rpm vinyl record.

Watch Wendy Saddington on YouTube

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for some interesting things to do . . . dot dot dot . . . scroll down past Lou

recently listening to




keep scrolling for interesting things to do . . . dot dot dot . . . scroll down

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Things to do in March and April :

Reminder for the Vagabond Press reading
at University of Sydney
on Wednesday March 19th at 6.15pm

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Art Exhibition Opening

                                      Alone at the movies

Viken Minassian and Kerry Kirk
Directors,
Hat Hill Gallery

Invite you to join them for the opening
of Andrew Ireland's latest exhibition,
with organic wines and olives provided by Rosnay Wines.

Hat Hill Gallery
3 Hat Hill Road
Blackheath
On Saturday 22nd March
6pm - 8pm

                                  Boxing Day At Nobby's Beach

Click to Preview

Andrew Ireland’s diverse imagery focuses on the figurative in order to support his whimsical visual narratives; be they absurdist, ironic or quotidian observation. His paintings seek to weave a tale ... a tale layered in encrusted oil, wax and varnish. These essential elements have grown out of his early training and experimentation as a painter/printmaker. Alchemical reverse processes attract Ireland both in fable and in method. The paintings contain gently opposing forces; dream-like conundrums merge with observed realities, melancholia entwines with comedy and time drifts between the contemporary and the nostalgic.
Andrew Ireland was born and educated in Manchester, UK, undertook a Foundation Diploma in Fine Art at Salford Technical College and achieved a BA Honours Fine Art (1st Class) in Painting and Printmaking at Brighton Polytechnic. After extensive travel through Europe Andrew emigrated to Australia in 1985.
In 1986-1997 Ireland worked as an illustrator for the Sydney Morning Herald, Australian Financial Review, The Times on Sunday and The Australian. He was awarded The Bulletin's Black & White Artists’ “Best Humorous Illustrator Award” in 1990.
In 1991 Ireland successfully exhibited his paintings at Rex Irwin Gallery, Sydney (Solo Show). His work was purchased by private collectors and Art Bank Australia.
During 1991-92 Ireland travelled to live and work in Italy, where he exhibited at Gallerie E5 (Solo Show), Verona and Southern Gallery, Rome. He returned to Australia and continued to work as a painter/freelance illustrator. He was regularly involved and employed in art education; Sydney College of the Arts, University of Newcastle, Sydney Graphics College, Billy Blue Design School, UTS, UWS and Blue Mountains Grammar School. At present he teaches art at Korowal School, Leura, NSW.

                                      Books Do Furnish A Room

The exhibition continues until 13th April
Gallery hours : 10am - 4pm Thursday to Sunday
or by appointment (02) 4787 7033

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                                                      Kerry Leves



Sydney independent publisher Puncher & Wattmann
will launch Kerry Leves’ new collection of poems
A Shrine to Lata Mangeshkar


at Benledi, Glebe Library
186 Glebe Point Road
Sunday 30th March
at 3.30pm


Any account of Indian playback music must start and end with Lata Mangeshkar. Born September 28, 1929 in Indore, Lata Mangeshkar has been active in all walks of Indian popular and light classical music having sung film songs, ghazals, bhajans and pop. She is the supreme voice of popular Indian music, an Indian Institution. Until the 1991 edition, when her entry disappeared, the Guinness Book of Records listed her as the most recorded artist in the world with not less than 30,000 solo, duet and chorus-backed songs recorded in 20 Indian languages between 1948 and 1987.

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The Lee Marvin Readings begin again
on April Fool's Day in Adelaide.
Program details here

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The Leichhardt Espresso Chorus
at St James Church, Sydney on April 5th 6pm

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foam:e issue 5 is now up on the web
edited by Louise Waller
one click will take you there

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THE CHILDREN




Dear Europe

If I'd known that I'd see you there
I'd have dropped everything & come running


Poems by Philip Whalen; Photographs by Aram Saroyan:

Aram Saroyan took photos of children more or less his own age while travelling in Europe with his father. He sent them to Philip Whalen who wrote poems based on them.
Read Aram’s note on the project.
Read 'The Children'. Published online in Big Bridge

(This post, with the gracious permission of Aram Saroyan,
did beat Ron Silliman's blog by two days)

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Vagabond Press presents


PAM BROWN, CHRIS EDWARDS
& MARTIN HARRISON
reading from their work

Wednesday March 19th, 2008 at 6.15pm

Entry by donation.
Vagabond Press backlist on sale at reduced prices.
This reading is a fundraiser for the press.


Chris Edwards is the author of utensils in a landscape (Vagabond Press 2001), A Fluke: a mistranslation of Stéphane Mallarmé’s “Un coup de dés” (Monogene 2005) and Nicked (Vagabond Press 2006).

Martin Harrison is the author of The Distribution of Voice (UQP1993), The Kangaroo Farm (Paper Bark Press 1997), Summer (Paper Bark Press 2001) and Music (Vagabond Press 2005).

Pam Brown is the author of fourteen books and seven chapbooks including Dear Deliria (Salt Publishing, 2003), Drifting Topoi (Vagabond Press 2000) and Let’s Get Lost (co-author) (Vagabond Press 2005)


Wednesday March 19th, 2008 at 6.15pm

Department of English Common Room
John Woolley Building
Science Road
University of Sydney

Click here for a clunky campus map
1 minute from the Footbridge entrance from Parramatta Rd

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The second issue of Taipa-based Kit Kelen's magazine
Poetry Macao is now online.

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National Apology
9am Wednesday
13th February 2008

The federal government will formally apologise to the
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Stolen Generations
of Australia next Wednesday morning.

Join Sydneysiders at 9am in Martin Place
to watch the speech on a giant screen.
Information here

















Barbara Shaw, Mt Nancy Town Camp, Central Australia



















The City of Sydney invites you to join us in witnessing and celebrating the historic moment of the Federal Parliament saying 'sorry' to members of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Stolen Generations.

Everyone and anyone is welcome.

The City will provide two opportunities to view the live to air telecast on 13 February at 9am.

Large screen in Martin Place
In conjunction with the NSW State Government

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Indoor and outdoor screens at the Redfern Community Centre
29 Hugo Street Redfern

In addition to the 9am screening, Redfern Community Centre will hold a replay of the formal apology from 3pm with our Acknowledgement to Country, speeches by Elders from the local Aboriginal community, members of the Stolen Generations, the Lord Mayor and young people from the local community.

Other activities throughout the day include a community BBQ, children's activities, film screenings and live entertainment.

A community bus to the Redfern event will leave from the following locations:

8am - Juanita Nielson Leisure Centre
cnr of Nicholson & Dowling Streets, Woolloomooloo

8am - Ultimo Community Centre
40 William Henry St, Ultimo

8:15am - Glebe Library
186 Glebe Point Rd, Glebe (rear car park)

For more information please contact David Beaumont
dbeaumont@cityofsydney.nsw.gov.au
Phone: 9246 7873

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AntaR (Australians for Native Title and Reconciliation) events

ANTaR believes that an apology should be the beginning of a process of reparation. However the government should do what it promised in opposition: comprehensively respond to the recommendations of the Bringing Them Home report, a number of which deal with compensation.






If you’re travelling to Canberra for this historic occasion you can find further information from the Aboriginal Rights Coalition here






For info on Reconciliation Australia click here

Media link here

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                                                                          foto by K. Tamasi

                         Vale Jackie Orszaczky


                         news article here                         a blog tribute

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An acrostic poem lands Burmese poet Saw Wai
in big trouble with the generals : click here

                           General Than Shwe, not happy

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This coming Saturday:

JOHN FORBES
Ars Poetica




















John Forbes scrutinizes the latest issue
of New Zealand literary magazine 'Landfall'
at 'a-little-loungeroom-reading' poetry party
at our home in Ultimo, Sydney
in Summer 1996



On January 23rd, 2008 it became 10 years since the terrific Australian poet, John Forbes died suddenly, at the age of 47. To mark the anniversary of his death, John’s fellow poets, his family, friends, fans and poetry-lovers in general, are invited to come and remember his life and work.

Readers include: Jaya Savige on the influence of John Forbes’ work on a younger generation of poets, Pam Brown on knowing John in the 1980s in ‘Petersham Days’ and John Tranter, Alan Wearne, Steve Kelen, Rae Desmond Jones and Gig Ryan.

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Raving against the space
where the poem sounds
like a revolving door that
makes the noise a car makes
bumping into the dole –
that’s the target.
                 John Forbes, ‘Ars Poetica’

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free event
3.30pm for 4pm
Venue: gleebooks, 49 Glebe Point Rd, Glebe
RSVP: gleebooks - 9660 2333
Info: Click here

Books available at Gleebooks:
John Forbes Damaged Glamour
John Forbes Collected Poems
Ken Bolton (editor) Homage To John Forbes
published by (Brandl & Schlesinger)

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Ngapartji Ngapartji is the title of a theatre piece currently in performance in Sydney. It is ambitious, unwieldy, sometimes rough-edged, sometimes perfect. As a theatre experience, it is very powerful. It tells the story, in Pitjanjatjara and English, of the dispossession of Indigenous people by British nuclear tests at Maralinga in the South Australian desert in the late 1950s/early 1960s. But it has a global reach that encompasses Afghani, Japanese and Australian soldiers’ perspectives on atomic testing. It is told through dance, story, song and film. Hearing Talking Heads' Once In A Lifetime and Bob Dylan's The Weight and other songs in Pitjanjatjara is a unique pleasure.

ngapartji ngapartji :
I give you something - You give me something



Produced by Big hART, a group of professional artists, arts workers and producers who have been making work together for 15 years – creating theatre, film, television, painting, photography, dance, new media and radio.

Big hART most often works in small communities around the country, with people experiencing the effects of marginalisation in regional, rural, and geographically or socially isolated communities. Big hART experiments with the process of making art with such groups over three-year periods, honing the quality of their work, which is showcased in national and international festivals and media. This often creates new opportunities for participants, helps build skills in communities, assists regional development and helps foster a more inclusive Australian culture.

In addition to Ngapartji Ngapartji, Big hART is currently running a number of other projects around Australia, including Gold (Griffith and the wheatbelt, NSW); Lucky and No Comply (Tasmania’s north-west coast); Street Survivor (Melbourne); and Radio Holiday/Drive-In Holiday (north-west coast, Tasmania) and has recently completed the Northcott Project (Surry Hills, NSW) and Junk Theory (Cronulla, NSW).

Performance Information : click here
On now - Season Ends: 10 February 2008
Belvoir St Theatre
25 Belvoir St,
Surry Hills
Sydney

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Peter McGregor
anarchist, hedonist, academic, writer, activist, friend
1947 - 2008



Obituaries :

one
two
three

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This is the film, Rock My Religion, that was a component of the retrospective exhibition of Dan Graham’s work that, when I saw it some years ago in Paris, provided the impetus for my poem
Patti Smith Was Right

Patti Smith was right

these cold, known objects
                            are not very likeable –
      aluminium frames
         & curved glass with optical tricks –
but I am ‘at ease’
     at this show,
there are some nice little-grin ideas –
        like television 
              screening outside
          on the suburban home’s front lawn,
& time-delay verité videos
  to amuse the usually uncrackable
                                   hardened gallery-goer

  ∇

have I flipped ?       into a strangely placid
           political zone         a lack of clutter
  and environmental concern -
these things are so simple,
                   two hours here & I begin to enjoy
                                             Dan Graham
more than Soutine, Braque, Delaunay,
     Bourgeois, Basquiat, Sherrie Levine,
         Agnes Martin -               although
I can not deny my memory 
         of her beautiful mid-1960’s picture -
                        ‘Milk River’ -
nor her small collection
             of pick-up trucks -     the green Chevie
     glinting with polish – the very driveable
  Dodge parked
outside her desert home.

  ∇

I spend over an hour watching,
    surrendering to
          Dan Graham’s big “Rock/God” video
that makes a simple
           anthropological connection 
              between US tribal & religious ritual -
 group dancing, shaking, speaking in tongues-
                                      and mosh pits and rock music -
          so when Patti Smith sings
“Jesus died for somebody’s sins
                               but not mine”
                                                   I am converted.

  ∇

Patti Smith was right,
                     twenty-five years ago,
to say that rock music,
              meaning, then, for her, punk-rock,
would replace          painting
                                           & sculpture
     as representative of untranscended
                                                    life itself.

You can find brief notes on Agnes Martin here

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the NOW now 2008
is on this coming weekend
18 - 20 January
at Wentworth Falls

for program and tickets click here

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Went to the cinema today. What a truly great film - I'm Not There. (Me neither, maybe.) Todd Haynes is a brilliant film-maker. The musicians include Tom Verlaine, Jeff Tweedy, Ramblin' Jack Elliot, Cat Power with a fabulous rolling organ just like The Band's, Sonic Youth, Richie Havens, Antony and the Johnsons and, and, and just listen to Stephen Malkmus singing 'Ballad of a Thin Man' and the gorgeous, bright kid, Marcus Carl Franklin, the only actor who actually sings in the film - 'When The Ship Comes In' - and Cate Blanchett and the other actors' perfect lip synchs. Lateral timing, layering, representation of how identity is never fixed, how anyone is a different person every five/ten/whatever years and Bob Dylan is an imaginative imagination. Post-modern, beautiful and terrific.





of course you can click on it to see this retro 70s poster in larger format


http://www.IMNOTTHERE-movie.com

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John Forbes
Ars Poetica




Raving against the space
where the poem sounds
like a revolving door that
makes the noise a car makes
bumping into the dole –
that’s the target.
                 John Forbes, ‘Ars Poetica’

On January 23rd, 2008, it will be 10 years since the death of the Australian poet, John Forbes, at the age of 47. To mark the anniversary, John’s fellow poets, his family, friends, fans and poetry-lovers in general, are invited to come and celebrate his
life and work.

Speakers include: Jaya Savige on the influence of John Forbes’ work on the younger generation of poets and Pam Brown’s memoir, Petersham Days.

Readers include: Pam Brown, John Tranter, Alan Wearne,
Morgan Smith, Steve Kelen.

John Forbes' …insistences are always exciting, both intellectually and viscerally. He marries The Vulgar and the Elevated in a fashion no one else does, demonstrating the true function of Popular Culture and Cultural Studies is as subject matter for poetry. His vision is constantly making the ordinary extraordinary. His always brilliant similes renew the world, and the word…
                 Don Anderson, cover note to 'Damaged Glamour' (1998)

Saturday, February 02, 2008
3.30 for 4pm Free Event

Venue: gleebooks, 49 Glebe Point Rd, Glebe
RSVP: gleebooks - 9660 2333
Info: Click here

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                Ken Searle


                INTROSPECTION : New Drawings

              Opens: 6-8pm Wednesday 16 January 2008
              Closes: 5pm Saturday 2 February 2008

              Watters Gallery
              109 Riley St.
              East Sydney

              Tel: 61 2 9331 2556
              info@wattersgallery.com
              www.wattersgallery.com

              Hours: Tues and Sat: 10am - 5pm
              Wed, Thurs, Fri: 10am -7pm


                 click on image to enlarge

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                               Jan McKemmish, writer and academic                                           1950 - 2007

Only four weeks after becoming ill with cancer, my friend of thirty-one years and my co-writer of various performance texts,
Jan McKemmish, died at the Freemasons' Hospital in East Melbourne on the evening of Xmas Eve. My partner Jane and
I deeply mourn her death.



(poster by jan mackay)



Rumi
A Community of the Spirit

There is a community of the spirit.
Join it, and feel the delight
of walking in the noisy street,
and being the noise.

Drink all your passion,
And be a disgrace.

Close both eyes
To see with the other eye.

Open your hands,
If you want to be held.

Sit down in this circle.

Quit acting like a wolf, and feel
the shepherd’s love filling you.

At night your beloved wanders.
Don’t accept consolations.

Close your mouth against food.
Taste the lover’s mouth in yours.

*

Be empty of worrying.
Think of who created thought!

Why do you stay in prison
when the door is so wide open?

Move outside the tangle of fear-thinking.
Live in silence.

Flow down and down in always
widening rings of being.

Michael Hurley read these selections from Rumi’s poems at Jan’s funeral
in Richmond, Melbourne on Saturday 29th December.

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Jan McKemmish, Redfern, Sydney in the mid 1980s
(fotos by Margot Nash)

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    That's the spirit !

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This snap of an oniomaniac, (that is the word, isn't it Melissa?) shopaholic, (well, the trolleys must have been full once), alcoholic, kinda bleak-yet-arty Australian xmas tree arrived in my inbox today, via the University of Technology Sydney academic staff's xmas-greeting emails. I hope visitors to the deletions can appreciate it and meanwhile, I'll wish you, my three or four (five or six?) friendly, faithful readers, all the best for the silly season and for 2008

Santa says 'remember, click on pic to enlarge'

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  I heart UbuWeb
  http://www.ubu.com

There is so much on UbuWeb and it's entirely free.
You just need to make the time.
Factor it in, if you're planning a festive season break.


(does that read like a commercial?)

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wonderama fluoroama diorama

A museum in a town called Mount Victoria - it's kind of Victorian




Stuffed, embarrassed or bashful, fauna


click on the images to enlarge them, if you're game

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Adelaide, the Athens of the South, has been hosting an international guitar festival that wraps up this weekend. If you stay on in town until Tuesday night you can catch the final in the Lee Marvin Readings - for details CLICK HERE

                        'I'm looking forward to Tuesday night'- Lee Marvin

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Also - just published -
The last issue of Jacket magazine for 2007
(special stocking-stuffer issue!)

Click Here To Read Jacket 34

Editor: John Tranter | Associate Editor: Pam Brown

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