Garma Festival.  Yirrkala NT.  Australia

The Annual Garma Festival is Australia's Leading Cultural Exchange event.  It is held annually onsite at remote Gulkula, a traditional meeting ground in Arnhem land.   

The 2013 program will consist of two forums that link together in the evening ceremony (bunggul) and celebration of song (manikay), art (miny'tji) and Yolngu dance. 

The Key Forum, which deals with major contemporary issues of the Aboriginal world, will run from Friday morning to Saturday afternoon, its theme: A Bi-Partisan Project: Partnerships, Reconcilation & Future Prosperity...

A series of lectures and workshops will also focus on the issue of Constitutional Change as Yolngu clans and participants mark the 50th Anniversary of the Yirrkala Bark Petition

Also and including a music creation workshop at the ARDS Nhulunbuy recording studio that bridges Gove Pennisula Festival and Garma and brings musicians from both festivals together to share their skills with local musicians and each other. The goal will be the creation of a musical work that bridges the themes of the two festivals. A further outcome for the local participants will be a performance of the created work at Garma. Another outcome is an informal live video and audio recording of the completed song/music that has been created in their workshop week for broadcast on radio (Yolngu Radio & Gove FM) and online (youtube). The recording will also be used as a demo to send to interested record labels.