A little over a couple of decades ago I interviewed a lad in his late teens by the name of William Barton. He played the digeridoo and his mum, Delmae, was an opera singer. Our meeting was to preview his first performance with the Queensland Symphony Orchestra (QSO).

In fact, the interview was actually with William and his mum. The two have always been close.

In the years since it has been wonderful watching him develop into a musician and composer who now performs with orchestras all over the world. With his partner in life and music, violinist Veronique Serret, he is one half of the most exciting duos performing today.

And this tall, stately, proud Kalkadunga man is still as humble and friendly as he was when we first met. Now he is renowned the world over and last month in Sydney he was given the Richard Gill Award for Distinguished Services to Australian Music at the 20203 Art Music Awards. At 42 he is the award’s youngest ever recipient.

He has collaborated with the QSO many times over the years and on the weekend performed with them again in Cairns under the baton of new chief conductor Umberto Clerici.

The concert, entitled Barton Meets Tchaikovsky, featured Barton and Serret performing their recent collaboration Kalkani (Heartland) and featured Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5 and Australian composer Peter Sculthorpe’s famous Earth Cry which features the playing of William Barton.

That was a nice warm-up for an announcement in Brisbane on Monday that Barton, undoubtedly the world’s foremost digeridoo player, is partnering with the QSO in an extraordinary project which seeks the next generation of of storytellers and song makers to collaborate and create a Song to Country. Barton, Serret and Barton’s mum, Aunty Delmae Barton were on hand with members of the QSO to announce the project outside the Maritime Museum, South Bank.

Warrma piipa: ngati pattihja, kutu patija; ngata waru (Songbook: My Story; Your Story; Our Journey) is a unique and ambitious multi-year, multi-artform project that will weave stories, language, song music and creative expression into a unique Queensland composition.

This journey began, as it should, in William Barton’s ancestral country of Mount Isa/Kalkadoon last month with a ceremony to open a collaborative circle with QSO. It will continue now with Barton and the orchestra visiting communities including Cairns/Yarrabah, Rockhampton/Woorabinda, Gold Coast/Yugambeh, Charleville/Bidjara (Barton’s mother’s country) and to close the circle of the warrma piipa (Songbook) it will return to Mt Isa/Kalkadoon.

QSO Chief Executive Yarmilla Alfonzetti accompanied William and his mum, Aunty Dalmae Barton to Mount Isa for the opening ceremony.

Ms Alfonzetti says warrma piipa was important to the QSO.

“As our journey deepens and ultimately gains momentum, we have made a pledge to lead with compassion, to listen closely, and to find ways and places in all that we do for our First Nations kindred spirits to become part of QSO,” she says.

“We are fortunate to have William Barton lead us in this extraordinary partnership. He has expanded the horizons of the didgeridoo and communicated a cultural landscape though music and song to audiences across the country and across the globe. He’s also had a 25-year relationship with QSO, which started when he was just 17 years old.

“Travelling and working alongside William, making music and visiting communities to find the next generation of First Nations storytellers and song-makers will be one of the most powerful experiences we will all have, and we are committed to ensure it lasts for generations to come.”

William Barton says he will be using his voice “together with the sonic force of the Queensland Symphony Orchestra” to “represent ideas and interpret the legacy of landscape, and the hope and potential of those who live on it.”

“In creating the warrma piipa project, I acknowledge those aunties, uncles, grandfathers and grandmothers and I acknowledge my mother and father for creating a safe space, a pathway of connection and nurturing the next generation of cultural and musical ambassadors between our two worlds.

“I am humbled by this moment, to share my journey and ideas with my community of Kalkatungu, and so many communities across Queensland – this is the power of the Message Stick we are using, it will record what we cannot. This will be a living breathing time capsule of legacy for the future. Warrma piipa is my story, your story, our journey.”

When I spoke to chief conductor Umberto Clerici about this recently, he pointed out this was an important way of including those who don’t have access to the normal pathways to a musical career.

To get the project started a set of warrma piipa clap or message sticks will be gifted to participating communities by William Barton as an invitation to a final corroboree in a few years’ time. These message sticks have a modern edge – within them is a USB to record each community’s contribution to the project and enable tracking of the journey.

And what a journey it will be … for everyone.

qso.com.au