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'Wangga is a genre of public dance-song from the Daly region of northwest Australia; the country that lies to the north and south of the mouth of the Daly River. The book (and this website) focuses on the songmen (Medjakarr in Batjamalh; Ngalinangga in Marri Tjavin) who have composed and performed wangga in the Daly region in the last fifty years.'
'Many of these singers are now deceased, though their descendants and heirs continue to perform the songs in ceremonies and various public events. At the core of the book is a corpus of some 150 wangga song texts, organised into six repertories: four from the Belyuen-based songmen Barrtjap, Muluk, Mandji and Lambudju, and two from the Wadeye-based Walakandha and Ma-yawa wangga groups, which are named after the ancestral song-giving ghosts of the Marri Tjavin and Marri Ammu people respectively.' (Source: wangga.library.usyd)
Notes
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This book is intended to be read in conjunction with the relevant sound recordings, which are available online as virtual CDs via the website wangga.library.edu.au, as well as in a separately issued set of seven CDs (see the 'List of CD tracks' at the end of this voluime). The song structure summaries in chapters 4 to 9 are intended to be read while listening to the relevant tracks.
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website link to For the Sake of a Song http://wangga.library.usyd.edu.au/
The content on this website comes from the book For the Sake of a Song: Wangga Songmen and their Repertories, by Allan Marett, Linda Barwick and Lysbeth Ford.
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This book contains:
- A Social History of Wangga
- The Music and Dance Concentions of Wangga
- The Language of Wangga
- Barrtjap's Repertory
- Muluk's Repertory
- Mandji's Repertory
- Lambudju's Repertory
- The Walakandha Wangga Repertory
- The Ma-Yawa Wangga Repertory
Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of
Works about this Work
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Voices from the Past : Songs from Dying Languages
2014
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— Appears in: The Sydney Morning Herald , 25 February 2014;'Launched on Friday night, the For the Sake of a Song: Wangga Songmen and Their Repertories. book and CDs are the culmination of three decades of work with Indigenous composers from Arnhem Land, the Kimberley and Central Australia.'
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Voices from the Past : Songs from Dying Languages
2014
single work
column
— Appears in: The Sydney Morning Herald , 25 February 2014;'Launched on Friday night, the For the Sake of a Song: Wangga Songmen and Their Repertories. book and CDs are the culmination of three decades of work with Indigenous composers from Arnhem Land, the Kimberley and Central Australia.'
- Daly River, Daly River - Wadeye area, Top End, Northern Territory,