Image: A group of approximately 25 people, dressed in red, yellow and black, smiling towards the camera.
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When Reconciliation Australia put out a call for local choirs across the country to come together to sing the iconic Indigenous rights song From Little Things Big Things Grow, by Kev Carmody and Paul Kelly, Engadine Uniting Church was eager to say Yes.
There was just one problem – they didn’t have a choir.
So, they created a pop-up choir, which included many people who had never before sung in a group.
Under the guidance of Heathcote music teacher Andrea Harrison, who volunteered her time and professional expertise, the choir practiced at three rehearsals over a ten-day period.
On May 17, they made a recording, and it was so good they were among 22 choirs chosen from the 500 who participated to feature on Reconciliation Australia’s final video clip.
The 1993 song tells of the Gurindji people’s struggle for their land in the Northern Territory, from the Wave Hill Walk-Off in 1966 to Prime Minister Gough Whitlam symbolically handing back the land eight years later.
The basis of the Engadine Uniting Church choir were members of two Indigenous studies book clubs, which meet monthly at the church to educate themselves on First Nations peoples, past and present and seek to understand relevant issues.
More voices were needed, so they recruited members of the congregation and the wider Engadine community.
Church council chair Sue McKinnon said, “People were deeply moved as they sang about Vincent Lingiari’s patient and dignified fight that demonstrated the possibility of uniting and inspiring enough Australians in the pursuit of a fair outcome”.
“The culmination of the song is one of ordinary people standing strongly against power and privilege.”
In the lead-up to the Voice to parliament referendum, Engadine Uniting Church is planning to host “kitchen-table conversations to model a respectful safe atmosphere for listening and learning, and act as a counter and unifying force against confusion, negativity and racism”.
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