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Lorna Fencer Napurrurrla was non-conformist, original (and) abandoned conventions, revolutionary, independent, mercurial, unrelenting, tough, funny, flirtatious (and) seriously dedicated, go it alone, irreverent, talented, energetic, confident, irascible, feisty, loud, imperious, cranky and her imperial majesty. She was prolific, chaotic and partial to intellectual stoushes, wicked, impish, forcible and would brook-no-opposition, a dab hand at getting others to do her bidding, tough, overbearing, born-to-rule, with a strong sense of self belief, a strong sense of self worth, bossy, wicked, (with a) rapier sharp wit.She was a loner, eccentric, individualist, over the top fearless, go it alone, against the grain, (and) very, very funny.

My dad spent so much time out bush and we barely saw him when we were growing up. He was always out on a community. And you know now when I go to the most remote little community place all kinds of people come up to me and say “Oh Kumanjayi sorry for your dad”. Just yesterday at the Art Fair here in Darwin someone said to me…and my Dad died ten years ago… an older woman came up to me “Oh I’m sorry for your father that Kumanjayi”…it is an immense honour and incredibly humbling when people talk to me about my father as they do.

One book I have to catch up with is Chloe Hooper’s The Tall Man. The other book I’ve been reading a lot recently is the Macquarie PEN Anthology of Aboriginal Literature. It is a mix of fiction and non-fiction. There are a lot of early letters, letters from Bennelong to a Mr Philips, Lord Sydney’s steward.

Give me about a half a teacup of bass

(bass riff)
Now I need a pound of fatback drums (drum riff) Now give me 4 tablespoons of boiling Memphis guitars This goin’ taste alright (guitar riff) Now just a little pinch of organ (organ riff) Now give me a half a pint of horn (sax riff) Place on the burner and bring to a boil. That’s it, that’s it, that’s it right there. Now beat, well

It’s a helluva long way from the grimy streets of Sydney’s Newtown to a balmy evening beneath the stars in Darwin’s Civic Park, a transition I made more than twenty years ago. Stories about heroin and amphetamines and train stations and rugby league are rarely part of the discourse in this part of the world.

Gary Lang is a Larrakia man and his forebears have lived with Magpie Geese in their country around what is now called Darwin for thousands of years. This performance is at once a blessing and an acknowledgment of the importance – economically, culturally and spiritually – of the Magpie Goose to Gary’s family and kin. It is also a joyous tribute to the dogged resilience of culture in country that has been stolen from beneath the feet of his people.

In the Territory the stories are all too common…backpackers in vans swerving to avoid a wallaby of a basking lizard or a stubborn eagle feasting on roadkill, losing control in the dirt, over-correcting, rolling over and over ’til they come to permanent rest in the the scrub…