Singing
Seaman Dan's singing came from family, friends and associating with natural musicians in his multi-cultural maritime working life, creating a fusion of music from Australia, Melanesia, North America, Africa and Polynesia, notably the Thursday Island 'hula' style. He has been a regular performer at Thursday Island's local hotels for many years.
He is "A charismatic and consummate performer, Seaman Dan blends traditional Torres Strait Islander and pearling songs with jazz, hula and blues," (from the Australia Council for the Arts' 2005 Red Ochre Award Media Release for the 2005 Red Ochre Award). The Red Ochre Award recognizes and pays tribute to an Indigenous Australian artist who has made an outstanding contribution to the development and recognition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander arts and culture, both nationally and internationally.
He has performed in Japan and throughout Australia, most notably at the National Folk Festival, Darwin Festival, Adelaide and Adelaide Fringe Festivals, Laura Dance and Music Festival, Tasmania's 10 Days on the Island Festival, NAIDOC Ball, and at the National Museum of Australia's Tracking Kultja: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Cultural Festival.
Now semi-retired at the age of 81 years, in 2009 he performed for the Pacific Leaders Forum in Cairns and the inaugural Cairns Indigenous Arts Fair.
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Famous quotes containing the word singing:
“Where there’s more of singing and less of sighing,
Where there’s more of giving and less of buying,
And a man makes friends without half trying
That’s where the West begins.”
—Arthur Chapman (1873–1935)
“I said, the poets are there
I hear them singing and lying
around their round table
and around me still.”
—Anne Sexton (1928–1974)
“Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away; for now the winter is past, the rain is over and gone. The flowers appear on the earth; the time of singing has come, and the voice of the turtledove is heard in our land. The fig tree puts forth its figs, and the vines are in blossom; they give forth fragrance. Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away.”
—Bible: Hebrew, Song of Solomon 2:10-13.