Mungangga Garlagu la
Culture Through Sound
Mark Atkins Erkki Veltheim
Directed by Mark Atkins and by
A deeply human story of homecoming
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT OF COUNTRY
Tura acknowledges the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the First Australians and Traditional Custodians of the lands where we live, learn and create. We pay our respects to Elders past and present. With solidarity and friendship we say thank you.
WELCOME
Mungangga Garlagula is a celebration of the life and work of one of this country’s finest artists. It offers a unique opportunity to experience the intersection of different worlds in a powerful, engaging and transformative way.
After 37 years of evolution, Tura now focuses on intercultural creative programs. Our collaborations with First Nations communities are recognised for delivering positive cultural and social impact outcomes across regional and remote Australia.
I have had the privilege of working with Mark Atkins and Erkki Velthem for over 15 years on several Tura projects, including Kimberley Echoes. It is through this extensive collaboration that Mungangga Garlagula was born.
Tura’s ethos is to ensure that there are resources and space for long term development. Mungangga Garlagula is a great example of this. It has taken five years of growing an idea to be able to bring this premiere season into fruition and I look forward to sharing this moment of great celebration.
Tos Mahoney, Artistic Director, Tura
This is the world premiere season of Mungangga Garlagula.
PROGRAM NOTE
Mungangga Garlagula is a collaboration in music, sound and story by legendary musicians and improvisers Mark Atkins and Erkki Veltheim. A descendent of Western Australia’s Yamatji people, and of Irish/ Australian heritage, Mark is a virtuosic didjeridu player and compelling storyteller, whose own lifeway, shared as a series of campfire reflections and haunting encounters, unfolds as the sensory journey of Mungalla Garlagula. Erkki is a Finnish-Australian multidisciplinary artist: a storyteller in live and electronic sound, and a remarkable performer on violin and viola.
Together with designers Niklas Pajanti and Emily Barrie and a company of exceptional Australian musicians who have created a shifting bed of sound for the work, Mark and Erkki lead us into a nocturnal world of memories, echoes, spirits and dreams, conjuring country through words and breath, the snapping of branches and the play of shadows between the listener by the fire and the impenetrable darkness beyond.
For many thousands of years, music, song and story have been transmitted intimately, through close sensory connection; their origins lie in oral culture, in gathering together to be transported. Mungangga Garlagula begins with an invitation to join Mark by the campfire, and to travel with him as he takes us across the porous border between day and night, dream and reality, the reverberating past and the emerging future.
A collection of didjeridus stands sentinel in the space, each tuned to its place of origin, each awoken by Mark’s breath as it gives voice to the fields and forces of the animate earth.
Like the great traditions of oral storytelling and music-making across cultures, Mungangga Garlagula is at once crafted and improvised occurring both here and now in the performance space, and always, across the vastness of time and Country.
CREATIVES
Mark Atkins
Co-creator, director & performer
Mark is acknowledged as one of Australia’s finest didjeridu players. He is also recognised internationally for his collaborative projects with some of the world’s leading composers and musicians. A descendant of Western Australia’s Yamitji people, as well as of Irish/ Australian heritage, Mark is known not only for his masterly playing, but also as a storyteller, composer, percussionist, visual artist and instrument maker.
Erkki Veltheim
Co-creator & performer
Erkki Veltheim is an Australian composer and performer. He has been commissioned by the Adelaide Festival, Vivid Festival, Australian Art Orchestra, Sydney Symphony Orchestra and Musica Nova Helsinki, and his works have also been performed by groups such as the London Sinfonietta, defunensemble (Finland) and Melbourne Symphony Orchestra.
Soundbed Performers (recorded)
Genevieve Lacey Recorders
Vanessa Tomlinson Percussion
Stephen Magnusson Guitar
Anthony Pateras
Piano
Scott Tinkler Trumpet
Erkki Veltheim
Violin
Tour Production
Guy Smith
Audio Engineer / Production Management
Mark Haslam
Production Manager
Tristen Parr
Technical Producer
Ruth Little Dramaturg
Ruth Little’s work has encompassed national arts organisations, remote rural communities, site-specific production and large and small-scale exhibitions and expeditions.
Ruth is currently the Dramaturg for Sydney Theatre Company. She has also worked as Artistic Associate at the Young Vic and Literary Manager of the Soho Theatre.
Niklas Pajanti Lighting Design
Niklas Pajanti is an awardwinning lighting designer whose practice ranges across contemporary art forms and performance styles.
Niklas has designed for a range of leading Australian and international companies including the Helpmann Award winning production of Angels In America and The Wild Duck for Belvoir which toured to the Vienna Festival, Holland Festival and The Barbican London.
Emily Barrie Set/Costume Design
Emily is an award winning, multidisciplinary designer for the performing arts. Her design work spans across theatre, circus, physical theatre, parades, film and television and has toured widely. Most recently she has designed for Jacky (Melbourne Theatre Company), Big Name No Blankets (Ilbijerri Theatre Company) and costume design for Working Dog Production’s Thank God You’re Here.
CREATOR’S NOTES
My life has been filled with stories. From sitting around the fire listening to stories as a child with my family, relatives and friends through to those I have created to reflect my life around the globe. Interweaving these stories into the fabric of Mungangga Garlagula has been a journey I have wanted to travel for so long and it’s been an absolute pleasure to work with Erkki and the creatives to nurture this into being. I’m grateful to Tos and Tura for their faith, support and vision. I am so proud of what’s been produced and excited to share Mungangga Garlagula with audiences, including the works premiere in my home town of Albany.
Mark Atkins
I’ve worked with Mark Atkins since 2006 but it wasn’t until we collaborated on Tura programs across the Kimberley and Pilbara that I truly understood the breadth of Mark’s cultural practice, especially his storytelling and poetry.
Following Mark’s lead to create a production of his stories, we landed on a concept of something that would feel like a ‘film without images’, with his magic realist texts creating a series of nocturnal scenes that have been threaded together with instrumental music.
Working on Mungangga Garlagula has genuinely been one of the greatest joys of my creative life, and I hope everyone who experiences these stories are transported to a world where dreams and reality overlap and merge, and where the everyday exists, quite matter-of-factly, alongside the mythological.
Erkki Veltheim
Tura People
Tos Mahoney
Artistic Director/CEO
Carly Davenport Acker
Executive Director/Producer
Tristen Parr
Producer
Rachel Ryan Communications Manager
Medeia Cohan
Development Manager
Sian Murphy
Communications Coordinator
Annika Moses
Project Coordinator
Hina Stevens
Finances
Tura Board
Robyn Glindemann
Chair
Rod Campbell
Julian Tompkin
Darren Grondal
Acknowledgements
The Mungangga Garlagula Tour has been made possible with the support of the Western Australian State Government through the Department of Local Government, Sport and Cultural Industries’ Regional Arts and Cultural Investment Program and the Australian Government through Music Australia and Creative Australia, its principal arts investment and advisory body.
Mungangga Garlagula was commissioned by Tura with the support of the Australian Government through Creative Australia its principal arts investment and advisory body and Ulrike Kein AO.
Tura’s Annual Program is supported by the Western Australian State Government through the Department of Local Government, Sport and Cultural Industries, in association with Lotterywest. This project has been assisted by the Australian Government through Creative Australia, its principal arts investment and advisory body. Presenting Partners
