I’ve just heard over email from Linda Barwick, that the CD by Kevin Djimirr, Wurrurruni Kun-Borrk: Songs from Western Arnhem Land, with extensive notes by Murray Garde, has just won, jointly with the Kembi dance group, the Northern Land Council’s 2007 Traditional Music Award.

I heard the CD when I got back to Sydney and I have to say (objectively of course) that it’s brilliant. An excellent production for which all involved should be proud. In case you’re interested, which you should be, the CD can be bought online from Sydney University Press for a mere 25 Australian dollars. It’s excellently packaged too, with very detailed anthropological and historical notes from Murray Garde, including both transcriptions in Kuninjku and English translations.

I don’t have a copy of the CD handy, so I can’t give an example of the poetry, but this excerpt from the SUP page should give you an inkling:

Unlike the totemic song genres of many other ceremonies in Arnhem Land, kun-borrk songs concentrate more on the episodic minutiae of human emotions, subtle physical movements of the body, conflicts, suspicions, and the gossip of interpersonal relationships. An examination of the song texts on this CD reveals an almost haiku-like poetic beauty. Small isolated incidents without any given context are presented in a few lines of a song.

Congratulations to Kevin, and to everyone involved.