Being blind and not having a left-handed guitar did not prevent Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu getting his music to influential ears, making him a new star of world music
QUEEN ELIZABETH, the Pope, Elton John, Sting, Bjork, Jools Holland and Terry Wogan may not have that much in common but the one thing they share is an appreciation of an Australian Aboriginal musician called Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu. The 39-year-old, who has been blind since birth, is a "sleeper" in the music industry. There was no great fuss surrounding the release of his debut album Gurrumul, but very slowly word-of-mouth has spread about the rare beauty of this music – to the extent that Yunupingu is now cautiously being touted as the next big world music star.
It’s music with the power to stop you in your tracks. Using just a guitar and a bass backing, Yunupingu sings mainly in the native Yolngu language in a voice that has been described as having “transcendental beauty”. The arrangements are sparse, to say the least, but there’s a weird magic to these collection of traditional and contemporary songs which are mostly written about where he grew up and still lives – Elcho Island, off the coast of Australia’s Northern Territory.
Despite his pretty impressive breakthrough, Yunupingu doesn’t do interviews; he prefers to sit in and allow his friend, bass player and the album’s producer, Michael Hohnen, to do the talking for him. “First of all, he’s very, very shy” says Hohnen. Second, he doesn’t have that much English, and third, within the culture he comes from, another person has been designated the spokesperson for the people. His role is as a musician”.
Hohnen explains that Yunupingu’s motivation behind the record was “to make an album that represented musically where he came from – not to copy some ‘fashionable’ sound or chase after the world music market”.
As a young boy, Yunupingu learned how to play a toy piano but when it came to playing the guitar, there were only right-handed ones available on the island. Being left-handed, he simply turned the guitar upside down – something he still does.
Completely self-taught as a musician, his first incursion into live music was when he joined the Aboriginal/White band Yothu Yindi but after years touring with the group, he returned to live on Elcho Island to forge his own solo career.
“When he came to writing his own songs, he wasn’t writing as an activist or a social commentator,” says Hohnen. “This is not an in-your-face album; he writes about the land, animals and botany of Elcho Island, which really is a paradise-style place”.
Yunupingu, who never mastered Braille and doesn’t use a guide dog or a walking stick, counts figures such as Neil Diamond, The Eagles and Dire Straits among his favourites but there are no traces of Western rock music in his album. It is perhaps why the album surprises so much on first listen – there simply is no correspondence with what is currently out there. Not that the album sounds “traditional” – more other-worldly.
Having sold very well in Australia, Yunupingu and Hohnen found themselves being courted by a number of major labels when it came to releasing the album in Europe.
“We ended up turning down the big labels,” says Hohnen, “and instead we entered into a joint venture with a small independent label called Dramatico for the UK and Ireland”.
Dramatico is owned by the songwriter Mike Batt ( The Wombles, Bright Eyes) and Yunupingu is now joining Katie Melua, Marianne Faithfull and Carla Bruni on the label.
"With Dramatico they're allowing us to do what we did with the album in Australia — which is to tour it and promote it on our own terms," says Hohnen. "It's not a typical top 10 record by any means but we got really strong reactions from DJ and then Jools Holland had us on his Laterprogramme".
It’s the live shows which are making the most impression. Sitting on a stool, with the audience hushed, there are no gimmicks and no props as Yunupingu just forces you into submission by the sheer power of the music.
Hohnen knows he’s dealing with a prodigious talent and someone who needs protecting from the more rapacious elements of the music business. “He’s not really that hugely fussed by the bits of success he’s had so far,” he says.
“I haven’t noted any significant change in him. I think it helps that he doesn’t have to do media. We try and do things in our own time – we don’t want to parade him around as this musical genius”.
And the reaction to his burgeoning international success back on Elcho Island? “There is a genuine pride in what he is doing,” says Hohnen. “They are aware that through his music he is bringing their world to the outside world.”
Gurrumul
by Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu is out now. To hear his music online, see gurrumul.com.
