Indigenous Australian Songlines & Songdrama – The Great Father Spirits

Indigenous Australian Songlines & Songdrama – The Great Father Spirits

(Warning: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers should be aware that this document/blog may contain images or names of people who have since passed away)   


Around 40,000 - 80,000 years ago, peoples from the Asian region crossed by land bridge to what we now know of as Arhnem Land. The stories of the Great Father Spirit and the journeys of these peoples and their encounters have been passed down in a form that can be best described as a songline. A songline in many Indigenous Australian cultures is a song or set of songs that are navigational and knowledge holding tracks. Elders train their people to sing the landscape and therefore they can sing the landscape and move and remember how to move from one location to another. At each location rituals are performed. One type of ritual (usually a group ritual) to some First Nations peoples is a songdrama. This is where ancient stories or knowledge are acted out or performed in some act with gestures.

Indigenous Australian Songdramas tend to often deal with the first stage of creation - the activities of the Great Father Spirit. Often the oldest indigenous stories are kept in a half-spoken, half-sung songline form such as those used in the Whale Arrival Story of the Thurrawal tribe of New South Wales or The Three Brothers Story of the Gullibul clans and of course the stories of the famous gwion gwion or jenagi jenagi cave painting dancers (known to some as the stories of the Bradshaw Cave Dancers).

A photo of part of the 30,000 year old Gwion Gwion (Bradshaw Cave Dancers) showing

a dance ceremony enacting an ancient indigenous ritual. 

These songdramas conjure up and re-enact events of the past capturing the moods, feelings and oneness of spirit. Some examples of songdramas include stories of the Father Spirits of Baiame (from the Sitma-thang clans of the High Plains), Mungan Mgour (from the Kuranda of Queensland) and Bunjil (from the Kulin and Wotjobaluk). In her magnificent book Singing the Land – The Power of Performance in Aboriginal Life, Jill Stubington illuminates the connection of songlines and song drama to the relationship of indigenous Australian people to their history, spirituality and social structures and traditions as evident in song cycles and ceremonies. In working with students with songdramas and songlines, it is good to remember that these carry knowledge and spiritual connection and as such songdramas and dances and songlines of these types should not be imitated or copied without permission. Permission is hardly ever granted to non-initiated Indigenous or non-Indigenous people. Some songdramas and songlines are only passed on through gender specified lines as well.

The songdrama form is one that attempts to set the thoughts and actions of significant long ago events, people and animals into the ever present. In some ways, the indigenous songdrama is like the Hindu songdramas and dance dramas in that they attempt to conjure up the form of the ancient spirits almost like deities (Reed 1993: 17-19). Often phrases and images are repeated, and emphasis is placed upon the conjuring up of images through the almost exclusive use of the voice: its tones, intonation, rhythm and volume. These rituals are often led by songman (the singer, keeper and composer of songs) a skilled performer with an extensive repertoire of stories and vocal range and skill. A number of songdramas and the musical accompaniments are referred to in Neuenfeldt’s wonderful book The Didgeridu: From Arnhem land to the Internet.

A photo of a songdrama being sung, enacted and danced by indigenous males.

The songdramas of the legends of Baiame often give the subject Baiame,  qualities such as Creator, Benefactor and First Seed (Reed l993: l7, 32, 53). The songdrama usually attempts to deal with everything in terms of metaphors e.g. instead of telling someone that your great grandfather came from Norway to Australia, you may say: ''My Grandfather is the devourer of all the seas and oceans'' or '' My Grandfather - the Whale of all seasons. The songdramas are always told proudly and intensely, perhaps this is why some European historians and anthropologists have remained sceptical about the knowledge which lies beneath these stories told in this form of narrative.  Songdramas are not just a ancient form used for ancient rituals but can be used in a modern context and within historical approachs to address specific stories and ideas from specific areas or places. The Little Piggies, an indigenous children’s rock group from Broome, act out and sing narratives as part of their shows that are like songdramas:

Shuffling on from Chinatown in his squeaky orange cart,

Like a paperboy who’s doing his rounds he knows just where to start,

Olanji, Olanji, one shilling, one shilling one, hiding in the shade from the midday sun

Mr Chinaman don’t turn your back on me, might take your olanji for free

(see Little Piggies, ‘Olanji’ on Dreaming in Broome 1997)

Here, this modern version of a songdrama gives a vivid sense of late 19th century Broome as a melting pot of Asian and Indigenous peoples and its identity as a centre of the international pearl shell industry reliant on Asian divers comes alive (see Edwards, 1984; Bailey, 2001). Important to songdrama is the language it is sung in. Often older indigenous languages are kept alive through songdramas because they keep flourishing the stories, rituals and languages of traditions which are ancient.

       

Further Readings and Resources on Indigenous Songdrama

Berndt, R.M. & Phillips, E.S. 1973. The Australian Aboriginal Heritage: An Introduction Through the Arts. Ure Smith. Sydney.
Bungalung (short film). 2007. Morton-Thomas, Trisha [Indigenous Director]. CAAMA.

Marshall, A. 2004. 'Singing your own songlines: approaches to Indigenous Drama' in

Mooney, M. (ed.) & Nicholls (ed.) Drama Journeys:Inside Drama Learning. Currency Press. Strawberry Hills, Sydney.

Mathews, R.H. 1905. Ethnological Notes on Aboriginal Tribes of N.S.W. and Victoria. White Publishing. Sydney.

Mullins, B. 1989. Aboriginal lore: a pictorial review of ancient aboriginal life, ritual and culture, as recorded in the marks they left on the land. Shepp Books. Hornby, N.S.W.

Neuenfeldt, K. 1997. The Didgeridu: From Arnhem land to the Internet. John Libbey & Co. Sydney.

Strehlow, T.G.H. 1986. Aranda Traditions, Melbourne University Press. Melbourne.

Woolgoodja, S. 1976. Lalai Dreamtime. Aboriginal Arts Board. Canberra.

Indigenous Songdrama Practical Exercises and Discussion

Indigenous Songdrama Exercises

Learning Goals

To teach students the students about indigenous drama elements and how to introduce metaphor into the telling of a story. To encourage students to use their own life and relationships to create metaphoric stories. To introduce rhythmic forms which are part of some indigenous drama forms.

Learning Sequence

Pairwork
Teacher demonstration (or organise a student to demonstrate)
Graphic Representation
Practice with feedback
Larger group work

Materials

Marker Pens (1 per pair)
A3 paper (1 per student)

Evaluation

Evaluation for this task should be primarily through encouraging individual and group feedback. Set up the guidelines for positive feedback and owning feedback through 'I' statements e.g. I liked it when...I enjoyed it when... I connected to... DO NOT given written evaluation and feedback to this activity since the stories, people and images used are personal and it is not an activity to assess but rather one to build skills.

1. Imagine a relative, friend or event that although long past, has shaped the way you are and what you have become. Facing a partner, attempt to tell a short story or anecdote about this relative, friend or event and then swap over e.g. My father was a railway linesman and he travelled large distances organising laying train tracks in the outback. When they made the trains electric in Brisbane, he put up the electrical power cables to power the electric trains.

2. Now re-tell your partner the same story using metaphoric rather than literal language. Start the story by giving a metaphoric label to the person involved. Students may need help with this. e.g. My Father, the Serpent Tamer. He would lay huge cages across the desert to make the Great Rainbow Serpent travel this way and that and go wherever he wanted it to go. In the big place of lights, he built a special device to drive lightning through the Rainbow Serpent to make it travel faster and through caves and over hills. My Father, the Serpent Tamer.
Extension: Tell the story in almost song-like tones: dwelling on the sounds and words you speak. Allow most words to find the rhythm and tone that makes them song-like. Also remember to let your voice and thoughts do the work (so try to cut hand and facial gestures to a bare minimum).

3. The group starts a tapping rhythm or chant. In turn each member of the group sings a short story about where they come from. You can centre it on a person, a description or an event. Try to inject some energy and drama to the songdrama. Remember that you can be metaphoric, reality is not as important as giving the 'sense' or 'feel' of the place. The group keeps the rhythm or chant going until each person has shared their story of their 'place'.

4. Get some members of the group to sing a children's song, popular song or ballad in their native language or dialect or in a different language or a language you don't know. The rest of the members try to learn the song or part of the song.