The arts: Music
The following clips have teachers’ notes related to this topic:
Violins not guns from the television program The 7.30 Report - Orchestra Tunes Into Mentor Program (G)
The Australian Chamber Orchestra under its leader, renowned violinist Richard Tognetti, has set up an outreach program for mentoring young teenagers. The musicians bring their music practice and music appreciation to a high school at Cabramatta in the western suburbs of Sydney where there is a huge multi-cultural population mix. The reporter interviews Tognetti as well as students and staff…
‘I will survive’ from the feature film The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (PG)
Priscilla, the bus, has broken down in the desert. An Aboriginal man (Alan Dargin) invites the three drag artists to his nearby camp, where they put on an impromptu show. Everyone joins in, including a didgeridoo player.
Dame Nellie Melba from the newsreel Australasian Gazette – Dame Nellie Melba (PG)
This black-and-white silent story from an Australasian Gazette newsreel shows opera soprano Dame Nellie Melba accompanied by John Lemmone, Lady Pamela Vestey as a child and others, walking along the deck of the passenger liner RMS Niagara, which has arrived in Sydney from Vancouver after a world tour.
Corporate image from the advertisement Australia Post – We Deliver 1 (G)
This is an Australia Post television commercial (TVC) promoting the organisation’s new corporate image.
Performance at the Japanese disabled festival from the documentary Big Bag's Japanese Adventure (PG)
The Big Bag Band performs ‘Hare Disco’ at the Japanese disabled arts festival. The Japanese audience is delighted.
Wave Hill walkout from the documentary Blood Brothers – From Little Things Big Things Grow (PG)
Kevin Carmody and Paul Kelly discuss the song ‘From Little Things Big Things Grow’. They also discuss the Wave Hill walkout, when the Gurindji people – led by Vincent Lingiari – went on strike to get their land back from British Lord Vestey. Black-and-white footage of the actual strike is juxtaposed with the interview with Carmody and Kelly.
Singing history from the documentary Blood Brothers – From Little Things Big Things Grow (PG)
Carmody is flipping through records. He stops to examine a book. He tells us about the images from the book, of kangaroos and landscape drawn from within white sensibility. He shows us many images of Aboriginal people, and how Aboriginal people were depicted by white historians. This sequence ends with Carmody singing a song based on a saying by his…
Dame Nellie Melba and her cockatoo from the home movie Dame Nellie in the Mitchell Estate Garden, Lilydale (PG)
Dame Nellie Melba walks along the veranda of the house, puts up an umbrella and walks into the garden. She then dances and sings beside a cockatoo.
Musical paralysis from the documentary Dance of Nature: The Music of Ross Edwards (PG)
Australian composer Ross Edwards went to London to study composition. He worked obsessively in a damp flat and began to feel claustrophobic, which affected his work. He moved to the countryside of Yorkshire in Northern England and slowly began to appreciate nature. This significantly influenced his compositions.
‘The rustle of tropical palms’ from the documentary The Dance of the Eyes (PG)
In this 1940s travelogue we see a traditional dance of the Balinese women The Dance of the Eyes. We are told that it is rarely performed.
A tribute to Tamworth from the documentary Doesn't Everybody Want a Golden Guitar (PG)
Townsfolk and visitors to the Tamworth Country Music Festival pay tribute to the town.
How to be a country music star from the documentary Doesn't Everybody Want a Golden Guitar (PG)
Music professionals give advice about succeeding as a country music star.
What have those little monsters been telling you? from the feature film The Getting of Wisdom (PG)
Laura (Susannah Fowle) joins the other girls for an illicit midnight feast, with her cake and other supplies stolen from the kitchen. Maria (Sigrid Thornton) terrifies them with stories of what happens in childbirth. During a break in her piano practice, Laura throws herself on the shoulder of the senior girl, Evelyn Suitor (Hilary Ryan), declaring she won’t let men…
Blair’s marriage from the documentary Harold (PG)
Dorothy Blair recalls how she met and fell in love with Harold. Mixed race marriage was unusual in the 1950s and both families objected. Dorothy’s sister Florence Trevail expresses her views on the marriage, while Harold’s sister Meryl Thompson recalls the controversy on the Aboriginal side.
‘I can cope with that’ from the documentary Hephzibah (PG)
Concert pianist, Hephzibah Menuhin (1920–1981) and her brother violinist Yehudi Menuhin are backstage after a performance. Heirs to the Aspro fortune, Lindsay and Nola Nicholas meet them and within months Hephzibah marries Lindsay and Nola marries Yehudi. Shirley Nicholas, Lindsay’s stepmother, recalls the outgoing, vivacious Hephzibah.
Promised bride from the documentary The Joys of the Women (PG)
Kavisha Mazzella performs a song about an arranged marriage to a man in a ‘faraway country’ – Australia. The song’s story is acted out music-video style in black and white.
Italy revisited from the documentary The Joys of the Women (PG)
Kavisha Mazzella visits Italy to find traditional songs. She interviews musicologist Professor Ugo Vuoso about how the songs are recorded for posterity.
‘Menstruation blues’ from the documentary Lowering the Tone: 45 Years of Robyn Archer (PG)
Australian singer Robyn Archer performs the song ‘Menstruation Blues’. ‘I explore anything that I want to’, says Archer.
What was this pain about? from the short feature My Life Without Steve (G)
Liz affirms her commitment to love, but vows never to repeat (or at least try never to repeat) the experience of loss she has felt after the end of the relationship with Steve. She quotes Neil Finn, Bob Dylan and Juliet Mitchell and tries to understand the meaning of her months of pain.
Musetta from the documentary Outback Opera, La Boheme Tour (G)
The Australian opera is on tour with La Boheme. Musetta sings one of the operas most popular arias from Act II. In it, she is trying to reignite her lover Marcello’s passion.
Going to the opera from the documentary Outback Opera, La Boheme Tour (G)
The Australian opera is on tour with La Boheme. The conductor, Tobias Foskett, prepares before the performance. The cast dresses and puts on make-up. Audiences arrive at the theatre and taxi driver, Nicolaas Voorendt admits he always cries during the opera.
‘Am I mad enough?’ from the feature film Shine (G)
David (Noah Taylor) is now a star student at the Royal College of Music in London, and one of the candidates for the Concerto Medal. He proposes performing Rachmaninoff’s 3rd Concerto for Piano for his competition piece. His teacher, Professor Cecil Parkes (John Gielgud) begins the task of preparing him for a piece that he describes as ‘a monster’. Parkes…
What is culture? from the documentary Warren H Williams, the stories, the songs (G)
Warren H Williams and John Williamson singing a song beneath the shadow of Uluru. Warren H Williams explains what culture means to him.
Mbantua from the documentary Warren H Williams, the stories, the songs (G)
A 60 Minutes crew film Warren H Williams and John Williamson around a campfire as they sing a song about 1,000 feet of people having walked through this land. Warren collaborates with Ted Egan. Warren talks about translating the song into Arrernte which makes it a song for everyone.
What is a conductor? from the documentary The Young One: A Portrait of the Conductor Simone Young (PG)
Simone Young is seen conducting the opera Tristan and Isolde by Richard Wagner. Conductors Barenboim, Charles Mackerras and Norman Lebrecht author of The Maestro Myth, comment on Young.
