Listen up, it’s WOW Sounds
WOW Sounds Australia has been commissioned for the global WOW Sounds platform; 10 tracks from Australian female musicians and spoken word artists, all contributing to the conversation on key issues for women and girls in Australia today and using their music, poetry and writing to contribute to positive social change. WOW Sounds Australia has been developed as part of the UK/Australia Season, a joint initiative by the British Council and the Australian Government’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) with the theme ‘Who are we now’.
UK cultural leader and journalist Hannah-Azieb Pool was commissioned to interview a selection of these artists on their work.
When it feels as if the world around you is collapsing, there are few quicker, more spiritually nourishing, ways to reset than by listening to your favorite music artist, or watching a spoken word poet really tackle the world head on. Whether it’s on stage through their music, letting rip in a poetry slam or soaking up their ad libs in a festival set, witnessing artists process this troubling world and somehow turn it into something beautiful for us all to share is one of the wonders of human existence. Nowhere is this more so than a space like WOW, where music meets activism meets community.
To give create more space for these healing interventions, WOW sat down with four incredible artists presented by WOW Australia in partnership with the WOW Foundation; Saraima Navara, Shirin Majd, SOLCHLD, and Áine Tyrrell to talk about feminism, inspiration and speaking truth to power.
To listen to the music that each interviewee describes, follow along on WOW Global Youtube channel for the full length videos, or catch them as shorter reels on the WOW Australia Instagram channel.
Saraima Navara
Singer songwriter Saraima Navara has brought her unique soulful sounds to many stages, nationally and internationally. Of Papua New Guinean and Greek heritage, Saraima has performed at Woodford Folk Festival, Bello Winter Music Festival and Mullumbimby Music Festival, performed with acclaimed Indigenous artists including Emily Wurramara, renowned Papua New Guinean artist George Telek and with the seven-piece vocal ensemble The Verandah Chix, and released a single with Ugandan artist Papa Cidy. Saraima fuses language, heritage and feminine power to create space for powerful conversations and moments of healing.
How do you like to describe yourself and your work? I’m a Pacific Islander-Australian woman. I’m a musician, singer songwriter but I also create music for others and I direct my own music videos.
I have always loved music, I was the annoying sister in the car who was always singing and everyone would tell me to stop. My dad also played a bit of guitar and sang, when I saw him he would always be singing.
How did you find your art form? I fell into it. My mum has been in the industry and loved music. When I was a young child she would take me to Woodford Folk Festival, I would be dancing in the mosh pits, playing in the mud, I've been around music my whole life.
Does music have a healing narrative for you? I’ve always thought of my music as healing, for myself and also for everyone else. One of my songs is about climate change in the Pacific, it’s about healing the earth. My song ‘Map’ is a love song but it’s also about healing in relationships. I hope to heal others through my music and encourage them to connect with their own emotions.
My father was an abusive man, for my childhood we were running from him, moving houses all the time. I went through so much as a teenager; drug abuse and relationship abuse, I didn’t think about how bad it was or the impact it had on me and then it was released through my music.
Is your art a form of activism? I am using my music to give a voice to the community, using my platform to speak about what is happening. I’m a Pacific Islander, the film director on the video for my climate change song is from the Solomon Islands - it was really important to create it with people who have been affected. The footage was shot in the Solomon Islands, showing people’s homes destroyed. It's the same with my song tackling domestic violence. I've seen so many people affected by it, music has given them a place where they feel safe, where they feel it's ok to talk about it. For women to have a safe space for their stories to be heard is important, that's what I try to make my music about. I’m terrible at talking but as soon as I put pen to paper I can write about anything, that's how I connect to people.
What does community mean to you? Community is everything.
Is your art a form of feminism? I’m still finding my own feminism. My mum is a big feminist so it’s natural to me, to do what I feel is right, no matter what.
Tell us about your process…To write music I go into a room by myself, with my acoustic guitar, and I write my emotions out. I dabble with other instruments and recently I've been experimenting with reaching out to people to collaborate. I’ve also been singing in Tolai, my grandmother’s language.
The first song I released is ‘Kaum Leva Tagu’ which means ‘You come and you give your heart to me and I give you mine’. The song was for my partner. I wrote it in English but I hated how it sounded, so I asked my Bubu, my grandmother, to translate it into Tolai. We did it together over several phone conversations which was super special. The lyrics aren’t important as the process of writing. The song became about keeping language alive and passing it from generation to generation. My Bubu, my daughter and I are all in the video.
Who are your inspirations? Hannah Bronte - she’s a friend of mine and she is so powerful, she’s from the Pacific and is a big feminist. I have collaborated on some of her work, I was a model for her and I did the vocals for one of her pieces. She’s a visual artist, but also a DJ, she’s multi disciplinary. She also helped with my first music video. Musically I draw inspiration from so many people, like, [singer/songwriter] Sabrina Claudio, [singer] Iniko - they are really amazing, they do youtube videos where they are acoustically singing in the rainforest. Their voice feels really old, ancient, and ageless. My friend [singer] Sahara Beck also inspires me.
Who are you listening to? Jorja Smith, Muni Long, FKA Twigs - they were my inspiration for my next music video. I like soul, I'm pretty sure I only listen to female artists. Powerful, beautiful women, that's my entire playlist. It’s so empowering listening to them and the way it makes me feel when I play their songs.
What are you reading at the moment? I recently read a book that inspired me by Glennon Doyle - Untamed. The blurb says this book will ‘liberate women, emotionally, physically and spiritually.’ As soon as I finished it, I felt I had to change my whole life. I need to break free from everything.
Who are your Feminist icons? My mother - 100% everything that she does. The way that she lives her life the way she wants to, no one can tell her what to do. And the stories she shares with me about going into these places where men are at the top and how powerful she is in situations like that, and how she handles herself is inspiring, she will always be my idol.
What would you like people to take from your contribution to WOW Sounds Australia? Think about our Mother Earth because she is hurting and wants to be healed. Anything we can do to help, even making little changes in our lives, we should just do it. And for the domestic violence piece I want to build a platform, I want people to know they can say what they need to say, there is a platform for you to be heard.
Facebook: @saraimanavaraa
Instagram: @saraimanavara
SOLCHLD
Born at the confluence of many rivers, Jamaican / Arrernte (First Nations-Australia) multidisciplinary artist Aurora, also known as SOLCHLD maps the journey home as she walks it, offering the lessons learnt along the way. Through poetry, playwriting, singing and songwriting Aurora creates intimate spaces where wisdom and healing can be found.
Meanjin (Brisbane) based, SOLCHLD brings you into her world of spirit and play by fusing soul, RNB and reggae with poetry and raw, soulful vocals.
Her debut single 'Cancer Moon', released early 2022, set the tone for the rich artistry and storytelling to expect from this rising talent.
How do you like to describe yourself and your work? I’m a Jamaican, Arrernte, multi disciplinary artist. My dad is from the UK, my grandparents from Jamaica, they came to the UK during the Windrush period. My other grandfather is from Mparntwe, also known as Alice Springs, so I come from the Arrernte people. I am a musician, a poet, and a theater maker.
I come from a very musical family, singing and songwriting is something I have always done. I found spoken word as a way to tell my own stories and stories that represent the people around me and communities I am part of. Writing and singing is a medium for me to learn more about my histories, the world. I learn more so I can share more.
How did you find your art form? My grandpa was the bishop at his church, my dad along with his 12 other siblings were part of the church choir, everyone played an instrument, everyone had a role. My dad was a producer, a singer songwriter, working at a recording studio in Brixton, where he met my mum who had got into music through her mother, a country music singer, a local champion, she played all the festivals around Queensland, in her house she has a big wall of trophies. We always had a studio in the house and artists recording.
Does music have a healing narrative for you? That's my whole experience. Being here, not seeing myself as either or, not having that extended family around that can give you a sense of belonging and being seen, my art has been a way for me to make a home in the in-between, find comfort and place in the ‘nowhere’.
Is your art a form of activism? It’s not even a conscious thing, it’s just part of my reality. My upbringing was very political. We were always talking about our experience, the experience of living in the colony, history, the lies of the kind of system we were existing in. Being a low socioeconomic Black family in white suburban Australia, activism is your existence, it’s how you move through the world, you don’t have a choice, it’s a responsibility to speak your truth. I am a mixed-race woman in Australia trying to heal intergenerational trauma, reconnect, and revive my cultural identity.
Tell us about your process…With music I will be in a specific emotion or I will want to embody a certain feeling and I will write from that place. With spoken word, that voice comes from this urge that if I don't write this down I will miss it, from a more urgent place. I need to get things out, I need to understand these words. And theatre is where they all meet, I’m really seeing it in my mind’s eye, and that will strike at any point and I’ll have to be in a quiet space to start writing, and from there it has to be collaborative
Who are your inspirations? I’m getting to a point where I am looking to call on my people more; It’s been quite a solitary journey, but recently I wonder what is the next story I tell and how can I involve my community and my elders so I can be a vessel? That's the next journey. I’ve been doing this thing in the city and I need to get home.
Who are you listening to? I’m about to be listening to Sza’s new album, Ctrl changed my life. I can’t wait to see what she has in store. I've been listening to Ari Lennox.
Are you reading anything good? I’m reading The Hard Light of Day, by Rod Moss. It’s about this man who lived on Arunda country for several years and had deep friendships with the people and tells his life there from the 1980s. It tells you about the early stages of the township and what their experiences were.
Who’s your Feminist icon? I went to a theatre show by a group called Polytoxic - they are an incredible bunch of women. The show is full of divine rage, and power and made a lot of people uncomfortable and that was what was so cool about it. The uncomfortability that people can feel when women stop the bullshit of formality and civility and just say what they want, I was really inspired by that.
What would you like people to take from your contribution to WOW Sounds Australia? Let it be a space for you to feel the feelings that you need to feel, and if you relate to the experience of being pushed to your limits to live up to the pressures of this society and this system, let it be a space for you to acknowledge your stillness, your needs and to find power in taking your rest. The song is about acknowledging that, yes, we have important roles in our communities, in the arts, in this world and that can drive us to work crazy, but we can’t be the warriors we need to be when we have no energy, when we are sick, when we are sad. Acknowledge we are here to create a new paradigm to success and for what that looks like, keeping your health at the forefront.
Facebook: @SOLCHLD
Instagram: @aurora_solchld
Shirin Majd
Classical singer, songwriter and Artistic Director of Sweet Sound Ensemble, Shirin was born in Tehran, Iran. At age 17 she began studying classical singing and joined the choir of Tehran Symphony orchestra. Before leaving Iran, Shirin performed several concerts as a soloist or with an orchestra in prestigious venues such as Vahdat Hall in Tehran, and alongside numerous renowned masters in Iran such as Rohani, Rahbari and Loris Tjeknavorian.
An award-winning soprano, Shirin graduated with a Master of Music Performance and Master of Vocal Pedagogy at the Queensland Conservatorium and attended the Lisa Gasteen National Opera School in 2012.
In 2019, Shirin’s show ‘Kooch: Songs of Migration’, debuted at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in Scotland and at SUNPAC in Brisbane, Australia. Kooch, which means ‘migration’ in Farsi, was presented as an artistic performative and collaborative visual experience with composer Mastaneh Nazarian. Releasing her 5th Album “Secret” in 2020, Shirin is currently working on a new multi art project Stolen Identity.
How do you like to describe yourself and your work?
I was born in Tehran, 1981. I lived there until I was 29 years old, but after the Islamic revolution it was against the rules for a woman to be a soloist. This was one of the reasons I immigrated to Australia.
My teachers told me I had lots of stories to tell, but they also told me I was crazy to want to be a singer from a country that doesn't have opera. I started to make my first show, Rebirth, to answer these questions. Rebirth is a multi-art project, it’s sung in Farsi and English, my journey from east to west to want to be a singer, and it started from life, love, hope, restrictions, rebellion and then rebirth.
I don’t want to ‘just’ be a singer, I want to create things and make change. My work is often a combination of modern, minimal music and opera, classical singing. I use many languages in my work, most often Farsi and English. I am always interested in the story of the rebellion of women. I have collected stories about sexual harassment, cultural taboos and things people think are really dark. One of the songs is about my miscarriages how it feels when you are fighting with your body, another is a combined story from two women in Afghanistan and Iran.
How did you find your art form? I started to learn music when I was ten, later was in a choir. A teacher said I was good enough to be a soloist, but after the Islamic revolution we didn’t have opera or ballet, so I found a teacher and had private lessons. When I was twenty-three, I went to Armenia to have private lessons in classical singing. I went to Mozart summer school in Austria and met my teacher [acclaimed American soprano] Barbara Bonney. Then I became a student in the university of Salzburg and the conservatory in Graz, Austria, where I had to learn German in 4 months. After that I continued my education at the Queensland Conservatorium.
Does music have a healing narrative for you? Yes - I can’t live without music, I found myself through classical singing. These days I like to combine classical and folk music. I love to sing in different languages. In one performance I sang in nine languages - Farsi, Turkish, German, Czech, Russian, English, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, and Cornish.
Is your art a form of activism? I see them as connected. As an activist I believe in human rights and women's rights in every country. When I create something, it’s always layered, I feel responsible to share my stories and my music in the best way to have an effect on people. Beautiful music can get people to listen to a powerful story. Today I’ve just come back from a pop-up protest against what’s happening in Iran. We were in the middle of Brisbane, near the State Library, singing with posters and banners.
What advice would you give younger artists? Try everything and listen to lots of genres of music. Learn about different cultures and be open minded.
What does community mean to you? I am sad about Iran these days, but at the same time I am hopeful because I can see the videos coming, telling me about the protests. I am so angry at the government. Today they executed one of the protestors - Mohsen Shekari - he was 23 years old - he was executed for protesting in the street. They forced him to give a TV confession, after they’d held him in jail for 2 weeks, we know they beat people in jail, so they forced him to confess, and with that confession they executed him. It’s dangerous for the whole world, not just for Iran, that governments like this exist.
What do you do for self-care in a time like this? Most of the time creating is how I look after myself, so I wrote two new songs. I also go to protests and am active on social media telling people what is happening in Iran. This makes me feel helpful. It’s like I have two lives happening; a ‘normal’ life, where I go to work and a ‘second’ life where I worry about my family and friends in Iran. But I remain hopeful, one of my dreams is to teach music to children in small villages back home.
Tell us about your process… I start a project based on the things I want to say.
Who are your inspirations? For Rebirth - I was inspired by Forugh Farrokhzad, an influential feminist Iranian poet and film director. I started to read her poems when I was 14 years old. She’s a rebellious poet, she changed my view about how to be a woman, how to find yourself.
I wanted to be a singer because of Julie Andrews in The Sound of Music. I found it with my sisters and discovered I was in a different world when I was singing.
Who are you listening to? I enjoy all kinds of music. I love minimal music, jazz, classical pop in different languages, German songs, Italian songs. Ella Fitzgerald is one of my favourite singers and I really like Philip Glass.
What are you reading? Fraction of the whole, by Steve Toltz - I love illusions to dream and create.
Who are your Feminist icons? Nasrin Sotoudeh, a human rights activist who is currently in jail. She is really brave and did a lot for Iran and against these rules. Qamar-ol-Moluk-Vaziri- one of the first women singers who went in Iran without Hijab when it was compulsory, and she sang - this is so hard to do in the 1920s. And Julie Andrews!
What would you like people to take from your contribution to WOW Sounds Australia? My song ‘Can I’ is about how restrictions can feel like a trap and how self confidence can help you free yourself. The other song, ‘Freedom’, is dedicated to the brave Iranian women - and the men - who are fighting for their freedoms today.
Facebook: @shirin.majd.7
Instagram: @shirinmajdofficial
Áine Tyrrell
Having lived in so-called Australia for over a decade, Irish born singer-songwriter Áine Tyrrell rewrites what is imaginable every step of the way. She has earned herself the reputation of being an unmissable live act and can be found on stages across the world including Woodford Folk Festival, Shrewsbury Folk Festival (UK), Clonakilty International Guitar Festival (IRE), International Folk Alliance (USA) and many more.
In 2021, Áine was invited to join Irish President, Michael D O’Higgins and his wife Sabine in a ceremony and online tribute to the courage and creativity of Irish women. She has also garnered critical acclaim from national radio outlets in both Ireland and Australia with multiple radio appearances on ABC Radio, RTE Radio, Double J Radio, BBC NI Music and hit number One on Ireland’s national broadcaster RTE’s Independent Music Charts.
How do you like to describe yourself and your work? I am an activist, a storyteller, a single mum of 3 children. I am here in Bundjalung Country. I ended up here 10 years ago due to the financial crisis, I was supposed to stay a year. I’m very lucky that I grew up with a lot of melody, traditional Irish music has so much rhythm in it, it's always there. I'm working with a lot of indigenous artists and I get to feel into their song and dance tradition that is so different to mine but also about how we honour our story telling and bring our own experience in being alive.
How did you find your art form? I grew up with traditional Irish folk music. My father is a folk musician and a banjo player, he learned everything on 4 strings, so we had tenor guitars in the house, flute, tin whistle, I'll try anything I just like making sound and playing with it.
Does music have a healing narrative for you? Music has always been a very healing place for me. When I released my first album I was talking about difficult things, I wasn’t writing break up songs or love songs, but difficult stuff we navigate through and people were leaning into that. There is power in having difficult conversations, I was doing it for myself which brought me into activist space and place.
Is your art a form of activism? I didn’t set out to be an activist in my music, but I was an activist in my own life. My dad is an activist in his music, my mum is a feminist, I grew up with these conversations, we were at protests, and we were speaking about things.
Do you have any advice for younger artists? It’s very hard to stay true to yourself when at the start you don’t know who that self is. The more you play and the more you are in front of people and the more you try out different stuff you get to this core. A lot of time the balance of power is in men's hands. Women artists are more vulnerable to be preyed on - told we’re not marketable, I was always told I was too ‘niche’. Now I’m finding female led places are safer, it’s important to have artists who are true to themselves around you.
What does community mean to you? It’s everything. The power of playing live music is the power of being in community with people, all being able to feel something at the same time. That’s a sacred space for me. When I came here, the communities that welcomed me were indigenous spaces - it’s where I love to be, it’s on the fringes, those are my people. You find your people and then you hold onto them.
Tell us about your process…I wish I was one of those people with a 9-5 process, but I'm not. There is a very old ancient Irish practice called imbas forosnai - it’s how poets describe inspiration - to me it’s like a light or a fire, I get a firing rumbling and I have to create from that space, it’s the only space I know how to create from.
Who are your inspirations? When I see people in their truth. I love when people show themselves, whether that's in their art or you see someone skipping along the road and they are fully loving life. I look up to artists who are saying difficult things in a beautiful way, with grace and power and breaking the stereotype of what is successful in the music industry. I love artists who have a connection with the story and culture and identity.
Who are you listening to? Jen Cloher, she makes alternative rap and has just released an album. There's an American artist Courtney Marie Andrews, she’s a bit more country. There's incredible music coming out of Ireland from a lot of amazing women, it’s lovely to see that shining in all the glory. Artists like Wallis Bird and Pauline Scanlon.
I also love Sinead O’Connor and Enya. We've had a lot of incredible truth telling women in Irish music history and I love being in that line.
What are you reading? The Catalpa rescue. It’s a true story of the last convict ship which came from Ireland to Australia, full of Fenian rebels. It's a story of Irish history and the Irish connection to this land. They organised a whaling ship from Boston and 6 of the convicts escaped. I’m also listening to Brandi Carlile’s autobiography on audible.
What would you like people to take from your contribution to WOW Sounds Australia? My piece ‘We call you now’ is a way to look at history in a different way. We have incredible stories and histories in our DNA, it’s crucial we know that, so we know more of how to be right now, to have empathy and understanding of people's stories.
Both songs [in the WOW film] speak to our own personal revolution in knowing who we are and how we show up, so we can show up for community and others. There are so many cultures that make up what is so called Australia, so many stories of displacement, and colonisation, there’s so much of it in so many people’s history. The design of colonisation is to make us all forget - and that's also the design of patriarchy. We have such power within us to remember. Don’t be numb, don’t switch off, we have such power to remember, we have such power, in our families, in our spaces.
Facebook: @AineTyrrellMusic
Instagram: @ainetyrrellmusic
Hannah-Azieb Pool is Artistic Director/CEO of the Bernie Grant Arts Centre in London, founder of the Tottenham Literature Festival and author of My Fathers’ Daughter which was reprinted on 2022 as part of Penguin’s Black Britain Writing Back series, selected by Booker Prize winner Bernadine Evaristo.
IG @HannahAzieb
