Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars

Reviewed by Michael Dwyer

dirtsong
The Black Arm Band
Recital Centre, September 1

GREAT leveller, dirt. Scratch any surface and we’re all in it together. In spite of the divisions and inequities implied by 11 endangered Aboriginal languages unearthed for an overwhelmingly English-speaking audience, the strength of Dirtsong is its profound essence of something shared.

The Melbourne Festival had a hard act to follow after last year’s Seven Songs to Leave Behind but the demand was for more and even better of the same. So the ambitious notes from the hard road and beyond – subtitled a musical collaboration from revolution to redemption – was born.

I felt the first tears pricking my eyes less than 10 minutes into dirtsong. Lou Bennett was singing the show’s title song in her native Yorta Yorta, accompanied by the voices of four other indigenous women. Behind them, on the giant screen that served as a backdrop, bare feet slowly pounded the earth and kicked up soft clouds of dust. The effect was rituatlistic and deeply moving, creating a potent metaphor for the life force that springs directly from the soil.