Vast is a collaborative project that has taken some of Australia’s top musicians to the Pilbara region of Western Australia to work with local artists to create a unique series of works.
In a ghost town, 1500 kilometres from Perth, some of Australia’s finest songwriters came together to collaborate; writing and recording songs that emerged from a unique collective experience in an ancient and wondrous landscape.
Bernard Fanning, Sally Seltmann, Paul Dempsey, Glenn Richards from Augie March, Oh Mercy, Alan Pigram form the Pigram Brothers, The Panics’ Jae Laffer, Kav Temperley of Eskimo Joe, comedian Paul McDermott and many other notable musicians camped with visual artists and a musical instrument maker for a week in the historic deserted settlement of Cossack, in the Pilbara region.
The songs that emerged document their response to the awe inspiring landscape; a celebration of the land and the people of the coastal desert region.
Cossack is an isolated relic of European settlement on the banks of a river, which In the 1800s was a busy port serving the once thriving pearling industry. There are relics of the Asian pearlers; their names written on the tombstones in the cemetery and ancient Aboriginal paintings on the rocks of a nearby secluded beach.
The Local elders give the artists the traditional word for the area, Bajinhurrba, to use with blessings and speak of the areas deep history, while damper cooks on the sand.
‘Bajinhurrba is the Ngarluma name for what is now known as Cossack. Before settlement it would have been the place where our people lived, hunted and gathered up and down the mouth of the Ngurin river’ explains Tyson Mowarin
“Bajinhurrba is a place bursting with life and colour and beauty everywhere you turn”, said Paul Dempsey, while Powerfinger’s Bernard Fanning said the location made him feel like he was on another planet.
During the project musicians serenaded painters at work. Scott Wise crafted an electric dulcimer out of a piece of wood he’d found. Bernard Fanning and Alex Gow wrote a song that they recorded later the same night. Sally Seltmann wrote a song for the river while sitting by it. While Kav Temperley was doing vocal takes in the the desert as sculptors work in silence on the salt flats nearby.
The weeklong project created an album full of music which will be released on 16 November. The first single from Paul Dempsey The Sky’s Gone Missing has just been released. Alongside the album a feature length documentary was also created.
All proceeds generated by the Vast album sales will be used for the sole purpose of promoting, encouraging and advancing artistic pursuits in the Pilbara region. The fund will be available for any Pilbara resident; the award of a grant dependent on the review and recommendation of the Vast Project Trust panel.
Take a look at the stunning project.
Source: Media Release Image: Russell Ord
