Sky Song pairs new drone technology with ancient stories at Adelaide Fringe 2022

‘Fireworks meets Star Wars’ as Indigenous musicians and storytellers collaborate with a British drone art company for an exclusive Adelaide Fringe performance.

Ngarrindjeri elder Major 'Moogy' Sumner (left) and musician Nancy Bates with a drone that will appear in the innovative Sky Song performance during Adelaide Fringe from March 11-20 2022. Picture: Roy VanDerVegt

In the night sky not far from the South Australian capital on Friday night, hundreds of drones will take flight to deliver one of the biggest performance artworks seen on our shores.

Named Sky Song and commissioned for Adelaide’s Fringe Festival, the innovative work is rooted in a soundtrack featuring First Nations artists such as Archie Roach, Kev Carmody and Electric Fields.

When combined with the expertise of British drone art specialists Celestial, these songlines will be taken to heights previously unimagined.

“I’d describe it as fireworks meets Star Wars – but more than that, it’s a really powerful way for old stories to be told in new ways,” said singer, songwriter and soundtrack supervisor Nancy Bates.

“I think people are going to be moved in ways they’ve never been moved before,” she said. “I have tears when I read the script and look through some of the simulations, and I get goosebumps even while talking about it.”

With its swarm of 350 drones flying in formation above a 75m wide screen projection paired with music and spoken passages, Sky Song’s five chapters will focus on topics such as ancestry, creation stories, land rights, the devastation of the stolen generations and the hopefulness of reconciliation.

During the show, the painted visage of Ngarrindjeri elder Major ‘Moogy’ Sumner will be transformed into a star constellation as he tells a story, while similar treatment will be applied to a dance group from Port Augusta named Dusty Feet Mob, who choreographed and filmed a piece based on Archie Roach’s landmark song Took the Children Away.

“That stuff makes my hair stands on end,” said Bates. “It’s just incredibly impactful. The foundation of the production is the soundtrack – the stories, the songs, that’s what came first.”

A scene from a test run of Sky Song, to be held at Adelaide Fringe from March 11-20 2022 near McLaren Vale, South Australia. Picture: supplied

In January, drone art company Celestial performed a major work commissioned by the City of Melbourne which was well-received, but Sky Song will be its biggest undertaking in Australia to date.

Bates is a Barkindji woman who has toured with Roach as a backing vocalist and guitarist, and the unusual nature of this artistic pairing for the Adelaide Fringe is not lost on her.

“We’re working with a British company, telling First Nations stories in a country that’s colonised – there’s definitely been really robust discussions about the lens we’re looking at this show through,” she said.

“Our absolute hope is that people go away with an awakening, an epiphany, a stronger connection, a desire to know more culturally about First Nations people,” said Bates.

Held at a winery in McLaren Vale, about 40 minutes south of Adelaide and away from the city’s light spill, Sky Song will be performed on seven nights from Friday until March 20.