Song Lyrics, Music and Politics
In Building Community, Music Education Must Avoid Political Pitfalls
Music educators need to be aware that, while music can often bridge all boundaries between people, it can actually trigger divisions if used naively in some contexts.
In the space of three days in July 2007, Australians had several powerful lessons about how music can be either a bridge or a chasm. In the latter case it is usually song lyrics that are at the hub of political contention. When selecting pieces for musical education we must consider the intersection between music and politics.
Americans and Australians Unite in African Songs
At the 2007 National Conference of the Australian Society of Music Education music teachers joined the magnificent Keystone State Boychoir from the USA in a workshop devoted to South African songs. Under the expert direction of KSB’s Steven Fisher, they worked on two South African songs. A folk song, Khululu Imbadada,exhorted the audience to take off shoes and get them polished. Shosholoza Africa, originally sung by men wearily boarding the train to work far away, has now become a national song in South Africa. The driving rhythms and four-part harmony with melody in the bass typifies choral music from southern Africa, and the conference participants found the experience exhilarating. A powerful sense of unity grew as the Australian teachers sang with the American boys.
The Same Songs Divide an African Audience
However, Steven Fisher had once directed a local choir in South Africa in a public performance of these songs at which the white people in the audience grew anxious. This was the direct opposite of the intended effect! They remembered this music as the rallying call of black protestors in the apartheid era and so anticipated violent conflict. Though the anxiety passed and the audience came on side, the incident shows how music intended to engender warmth can sometimes do just the opposite.
Americans Win Aussie Hearts and Minds with Traditional Song
At the end of the workshop the USA’s Keystone boys surprised the departing educators by bursting into an excellent rendition of Waltzing Matilda, commonly treasured as the national song (not the anthem, mind you!) in Australia. A huge applause showed how music had forged a significant bond of shared feeling between two peoples across the oceans and national boundaries.
Sorry Song Controversy
The following day’s news across Australia reported an explosion of public controversy over a song learnt and performed in many primary schools throughout the nation. Contained in the latest edition of the series of ABC songbooks used by schools for at least forty years, Sorry Song was composed in 1998 by Kerry Fletcher.
She says she was not and is not associated with any political organisation. She “wrote this song from the heart” on encountering the personal stories of Aboriginal people who had been taken as children from their parents by police and government authorities over some decades. The song expressed her sorrow that Australia had allowed this to happen.
Music and Politics in National Stoush
Australian politics over the years since Kerry Fletcher penned her song has been marked by constant division over the concept of reconciliation between indigenous and other people. Many schools include art works like Sorry Song in their annual programmes to foster reconciliation between indigenous and other Australians among children. But the idea of apologising to the “stolen generations” and their families has remained contentious.
When one parent protested that his son should not have been singing Sorry Song, calling it political indoctrination, the school’s principal banned the song among her students. Political figures including the Prime Minister, John Howard, and Leader of the Opposition, Kevin Rudd, leapt into the fray. Composer Kerry Fletcher felt obliged to defend her song publicly.
Professionals in music education need to attend warily to the intersection of music and politics.
