FIFTH STRING MEMBERS BLOG: Ensemble Dutala
I remember the first time I heard Deborah Cheetham AO speak where I truly listened and heard what she was saying. Let’s be honest - sometimes we listen but we don’t hear. It was in 2019 as part of a Melbourne Symphony Orchestra rehearsal as we were preparing to perform her incredibly moving (some might say heartbreaking) work, Eumeralla. Based on her rise and rise as a composer and a love of her compositional voice, FQ had already commissioned Deborah to write a new string quartet so I was eager to absorb her words. Deborah had the orchestra and chorus transfixed with the suggestion that we might be able to make sense of the past and navigate the future through music.
Ensemble Dutala is Australia’s first Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander (ATSI) chamber ensemble. It meets online and in-person in the days leading up to January 26 and it was this “One Day in January” project that FQ was a part of recently. In a bid to see more ATSI people on the stage in our nation’s orchestras, Deborah is nurturing these musicians in side by side experiences with members of FQ, Melbourne Symphony and Orchestra Victoria. Deborah’s vision to provide role models, opportunities and make great music with like-minded people created this project that has made us understand the different ways in which we can acknowledge January 26.
FQ is now mentoring Ensemble Dutala scholarship winner Jackson Worley and will support him as he embarks on his music degree at Monash University. We’re also looking forward to opportunities throughout the year to play with Jackson and Ensemble Dutala Artistic Director, Aaron Wyatt, where we are hoping to learn as much as we can about their language, culture and musical aspirations. All of which seem far more interesting to us than correct rhythm, intonation and dynamics!
In 2020, despite Melbourne lockdowns, we were able to perform the digital premiere of Deborah’s aforementioned string quartet written for us (commissioned by Andrew Dixon) entitled Bungaree, thanks to Monash University’s online platform, MLive. This piece enabled Deborah to teach us gently about the extraordinary man, Bungaree, who was responsible for Matthew Flinders’ success in circumnavigating Australia. When we named the quartet in 2000, looking out over Flinders Street Station, we were certainly not “woke” to the many layers of complexity underlying the name Flinders. Through her compositions, Ensemble Dutala, and the One Day in January project, Deborah has given us a way to find our future cultural representation of who we are through music. Chamber music and string quartet playing has always been the ultimate conversation without words for us but the thing that thrilled me the most about being part of Ensemble Dutala was creating something together. Being unified in the creation of art and sound.
