Violinist/composer Jon Rose builds on How musical is man?, ethnomusicologist John Blacking's classic monograph on the Transvaal Venda people, with the question, ‘How musical is Australia?’. To answer his provocation, in 2002 Rose developed Australia Ad Lib, a website that advocates for a wide concept of what constitutes contemporary music praxis. The Ad Lib website coincides with a time when game-changing innovations to technology and society are on the threshold. Subsequent closure of the site prompts questions concerning the institutional theory of art, the politics of music vis-a-vis marginalised voices, and the perpetuation of cultural cringe. Underpinned by a series of multimedia pieces by Rose, the live show Pannikin features a selection of soloists from Australia Ad Lib—a practical outcome of the website and his research (including lost histories of Australian indigenous and colonial history that he reimagines and resurrects).

How musical is Australia?: A maverick's contemporary sound portrait of the fifth continent

The cultural cringe or difficulty that Australia has historically had coming to terms with art and culture is discussed. The review and analysis of 'The Lucky Country' by Donald Horne is highlighted, which expresses Horne's rage at his country Australia for being a nation without a mind.

John Montgomery

Papers

The Strange Tale of the Lucky Country, the Cultural Cringe and the Flight of the Tall Poppies