Interview by Erandhi Mendis
This week, on a summer night at the Sidney Myer Music Bowl, Warrnambool’s Find Your Voice Collective will step onto one of Australia’s most storied stages alongside the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra – marking the largest gathering of d/Deaf and disabled performers ever to appear there.
What began as a grassroots choir on Victoria’s south-west coast has grown into a bold, multi-disciplinary movement grounded in access, authorship and lived experience. As the Collective launches a new record label and prepares to share original work nationwide, we speak with artist GK and founder Tom Richardson about collaboration, community and what it means to be truly heard.
Ramona: Find Your Voice started as a local choir in Warrnambool, you’ve taken it on the road and now you are filling the Sidney Myer Music Bowl. Was there any specific moment where you realised the project had grown beyond what you first imagined?
Tom: I wish we could say that we planned the rise of FYVC but this is a genuine reflection of a community organically growing together – very rapidly… When 90 people turned up to the very first rehearsal, while we were shocked, Kylie (Thulborn) and I looked at each other and felt that there was something in this… 120 individuals performed at our very first show at the 2018 Port Fairy Folk Festival, 180 individuals sang on Australia’s Got Talent in 2019 and we now welcome 250 artists from across the entire south-west of Victoria.
Accessibility is often treated as an add-on in the arts. How did you make sure it shaped the creative process itself, not just the logistics of the event?
We simply started with the humans that were directly in front of us at FYVC and took the time and the measures to do our best to address any barriers or challenges to their involvement. We have an individual who has a vision impairment, so ensured communication worked for them. We have a number of individuals who are wheelchair users, so ensured facilities were more than appropriate for them. Individuals with lived experience of Autism, so took measures to support a spectrum of sensory needs. Consciousness around these individual needs combined with a genuine assumption of capacity plus ambitions for us all to grow together, led to a grassroots culture which has unapologetically guided any partners we work alongside.
In my experience, the creative process knows very little boundaries and the arts is the most level playing field on the planet. FYVC’s role is to keep up with the creative vision of the artists who make up our Collective.
Bringing together differently abled songwriters with world-leading composers can come with uneven power dynamics. How did you navigate that without smoothing out difference or complexity?
Fortunately, this hasn’t been our experience at all. With shared vision and clear communication from the outset, the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra couldn’t have been more collaborative or supportive. Alongside the majority of songwriters having a lived experience of diversity, so too do the composer/arrangers chosen for this project – Nat Bartsch, Georgia Scott, Kym Alexandra Dillon and Stefan Cassomenos.
In fact, I feel the power dynamic has subliminally flipped, with the recognition that the songs and stories of FYVC artists are both of world-class quality themselves AND come with the added impact of not always being as visible as they deserve to be.
This project is consciously designed to platform professional arts by practicing artists with lived experience of disability – from songwriters, band members, arrangers, videographers, graphic designers, presenters and visual artists.
Both FYVC and MSO are leaning in hard to make sure this show is as impactful and accessible as possible for both artists and audience.
You’ve devoted a lot of your career to building a more inclusive arts scene, what are you most looking forward to on Feb 13th?
This show will be the culmination of seven years of discussion and two years of development. I’m most looking forward to the reason this whole thing started in the first place – the energy, connection and emotional tornado that occurs when any large group of humans create music together.
Having sat with the FYVC artists in writing the first lyrics and chords of these songs, to now hearing them elevated by one of the best orchestras in Australia, is a very privileged experience for any musician.
The way in which these stories will be told will be about as impactful as a song can be!
This journey is being documented on film. When you think about the legacy of Find Your Voice, what do you hope future artists see and think when they watch the documentary?
We’re so fortunate to be working alongside Walking Fish Productions and their partners, who have a proven track record in diving deep and reflecting all sides of a community for the betterment of social change.
FYVC as an arts organisation has the awareness that disability is a consideration but not the focus. We’re fierce advocates for stories being told in the way they deserve, by the artists they affect – free from fluff or inspiration porn.
The documentary will be an authentic reflection of FYVC artists – with powerful stories and professional practice, who also happen to have a lived experience of disability. Showing the triumphs and non-sugarcoated challenges, the doco hopes to both advocate and educate those less exposed to a wide spectrum of humanity, while providing visibility and representation for other aspiring artists with lived experience of diversity.
GK, your upcoming single ‘Jungle’ comes from a very personal place. What is it like hearing your words stretched across a choir and an orchestra – does it change how you hear your own story?
GK: It’s just so amazing – there’s no real words for it, because this all started with the Choir learning the chorus to the song and that has really changed the song, from when I first recorded it – completely freestyled. I feel like putting it together with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra is going to be a whole other level and it’s just going to be amazing to hear what comes back from the audience at the Sidney Myer Music Bowl. Once the choir & the orchestra do it with me – it’ll be a really great ROAR of projection.
It’s been a really great mix sharing my original songs and I want to do more collaborations with other communities. ‘Jungle’ to me is all about creating an army of people who just need to put themselves out there and just feel free to be who they are. ‘Jungle’ helps me feel that I am best supported by the people I surround myself with. That entitled is ‘Jungle’.
Spoken-word hip hop is often about immediacy and closeness. Performing at the Sidney Myer Music Bowl is the opposite of that. How do you hold onto intimacy in a space that vast?
The way I always connect with an audience is to stay in the moment and to just hold it all in. Like when I performed at Triple J One Night Stand, I’m gonna do what I do best and channel the person that I was always meant to be. And the audience will be able to see that this is GK. I’m going to throw myself out there & when I get to the last verse, I’m just gonna let it out and make the audience feel like they too have a life and they deserve to be seen. Everyone deserves to have a voice and everyone deserves to be heard.
To be on that stage at the SMMB, it’s just mindblowing how big that stage is – to think that I have seen The Script perform there, and to think that now I’m about to perform there, it’s going to be another step in my level of building confidence and being able to be resilient in situations like being centre stage. And maybe this leads to the next stage of my career, performing at festivals, performing in stadiums or arenas – it’s just crazy to think that GK is going to get out into the world.
You’ve been named a triple j Unearthed Feature Artist (congrats!!) which is a big moment by any measure. This industry can be challenging, what kinds of doors does that recognition open for you?
I feel like it really has opened a lot of doors for me and being the feature artist for Triple J has led me to be nominated to be on the Hottest 100 for the song ‘Dynamite’, which I feel has really sparked a light into the eyes of the people who I’d like to collaborate with. I’d like to connect with the Hilltop Hoods and be able to connect with Guy Sebastian and Troy Cassar-Daley.
You started writing songs very young, what do you hope young people who witness The Find Your Voice Collective to take away from the experience?
Every kid always has visions of themself and they feel like they need to be someone. That’s how I felt when I first started. I started to have visions of myself performing in stadiums and that was how I imagined myself. I feel that now I am performing on these stages, it will really inspire young people who are just like me to be able to see that there is more to their life than what they think.
A lot of conversations around disability flatten experience into something “inspirational.” What do you wish audiences would sit with instead when they hear your work?
I have lived experience of Down syndrome but I don’t need to be identified by it, because I know who I am and that is never gonna change. I feel that a better word is “aspiration” and to the audience that will be at this gig , whoever does turn up – no matter what race, what disability, what background or their own hidden abilities – will feel like they are accepted into this Collective, because we project aspiration to them.
I’d like people to instead focus on my ability to see that I have created something for my life. And for them to really listen to the lyrics of ‘Dynamite’ and my other original songs that I’ve written because there are so many messages that they could share and take away from them.
What are you most excited about that’s coming up for you?
Well, I’m most excited to be releasing a new single (Jungle) on March 6th and I’m really looking forward to playing at the SMMB and to be with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra is completely surreal. The rehearsals with the orchestra have been a really great opportunity to hear ‘Dynamite’ completely orchestral. It just sounds so different to how we recorded and I can’t wait to be playing it with them.
I’ll be having another solo performance at Port Fairy Folk Festival, and then work towards a possible collaboration with the Hilltop Hoods.
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FRIDAY FEBRUARY 13 | SONDER WITH MSO -SIDNEY MYER MUSIC BOW
MARCH 6-9 | PORT FAIRY MUSIC FESTIVAL, PORT FAIRY VIC
