Toksave: Culture Talks

PARADISEC undertook a Library exhibition co-curated by Dr Jodie Kell and Steven Gagau at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music from August to November 2025. It showcased some of the equipment, audio techniques and innovative solutions used to safeguard valuable audiovisual materials for the future. It also demonstrated the importance of opening the archive highlighting the value of providing access for Indigenous community members to engage with the archive through its outreach projects.  

Episode 18 underpins the same outreach from the exhibition, panel discussions on 8th October 2025 and this podcast about First Nations and Indigenous perspectives focusing on archival practices and the importance of creating ways to connect and reconnect with heritage materials. The panel members include Chair Dr Amanda Harris, Dr Lauren Booker, Evelyn Quispe, Johnny Obed and Steven Gagau. 

PARADISEC undertook a Library exhibition co-curated by Dr Jodie Kell and Steven Gagau at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music from August to November 2025. It showcased some of the equipment, audio techniques and innovative solutions used to safeguard valuable audiovisual materials for the future. It also demonstrated the importance of opening the archive highlighting the value of providing access for Indigenous community members to engage with the archive through its outreach projects.  

Episode 18 underpins the same outreach from the exhibition, panel discussions on 8th October 2025 and this podcast about First Nations and Indigenous perspectives focusing on archival practices and the importance of creating ways to connect and reconnect with heritage materials. The panel members include Chair Dr Amanda Harris, Dr Lauren Booker, Evelyn Quispe, Johnny Obed and Steven Gagau. 

Starr Abelardo and Lolita Emmanuel join Toksave: Culture Talks as guest producers with a special episode looking at the SA1 collection and featuring Talaandig Lumad culture-bearer Rodelio “Waway” Saway and Filipino-Aboriginal Australian musician Rhyan “DOBBY” Clapham. Rooted in Indigenous advocacy—Waway’s bamboo innovations, soil art, and songs about mountain forests, and DOBBY’s songs uplifting First Nations voices on the rivers of Brewarrina Country—they explore how language, land, and lineage weave resilient, sustainable music. Hear song snippets in the episode and stream full tracks on Spotify: Waway and DOBBY.Guest produced by Starr Aberlardo with audio engineer Michael Manzini. Starr’s research recordings can be accessed in the SA1 collection.

Following on from Episode 15, this episode features the music and culture of Malaita from the IF01 collection of Ian Frazer in his fieldwork with people of To’abaita and neighbouring Baeggu, Baelelea and Lau. This episode covers a range of musical styles and their connection to the history of Malaita through conversations with Ian Frazer and Malaitan diaspora community member Mary Sattin. The episode presents the customary traditions and practices of Animae, the use of traditional bamboo instruments of panpipes and flutes and the Maasina Rule protest songs that contributed to the end of British colonial rule and the move towards Independence.

This is the first of two episodes featuring the music and culture of North Malaita, Solomon Islands from the IF01 collection of Ian Frazer in his fieldwork with people of To’abaita and neigbouring Baegu, Baelelea and Lau. In this episode, we feature the cultural practice and music surrounding the ngali nuts which are harvested from a canarium almond tree. Through conversations with Ian Frazer and Mary Sattin, a Malaitan woman, we are transported back to the 1970s during the ngali nut season where communities working customs and traditions were inspired through music in the

Link: IF01 collection https://catalog.paradisec.org.au/collections/IF01

Following on from Episode 13, we continue our exploration of music of the Central Province, Papua New Guinea featuring the PNG Peroveta Singers of Canberra. This is a special episode where the group responds to the PARADISEC collections of IC1 and MG1 with a Sene performance of traditional songs whose meanings are explained by group members Deveni Temu and

This is the first of two episodes featuring the PNG Peroveta Singers of Canberra, a group of diaspora community members who share and perform the music of Central Province, Papua New Guinea. They respond to the PARADISEC collections MG1 and IC1 with song and dance performances recorded in the ACT in 2023. This episode focuses on Peroveta (Prophet Songs) and includes an interview with group leader Deveni Temu and performances by the group in various languages from Hiri Motu to Hula, Keapara and Mailu from the southeastern Papuan coast and over to Rarotongan from the Cook Islands.

Episode 12: Buried in the Sand: Digging deep into Gudjal language and culture

William Santo is a Gudjal elder, author and musician. Opening with William’s song, ‘Buried in the Sand’, this episode discusses William’s long-term aspiration to uncover Gudjal language resources held in archives and utilise them to rediscover Gudjal history and culture and revitalise the Gudjal language. He is joined by colleagues in this project: linguist Peter Sutton, music researcher Myfany Turpin and linguistic student Alex Anderson. Included in the episode are excerpts from recordings made by Peter in the 1970’s with Gudjal elders and excerpts of the language learning podcast created by William and Alex.

The Sutton recordings are made available courtesy of AIATSIS, Sutton Collection, item 1913A.

AIATSIS has the largest recording of Indigenous Australian ethnographic recordings. You can search their catalogue here: https://iats.ent.sirsidynix.net.au/client/en_AU/external

Following on from episode 10, we continue discussions about early recordings made by Charles Gabriel Seligmann during the Daniels Ethnographical Expedition to British New Guinea in 1904. Deveni Temu brings his perspective to the history and context of the recordings. He is a Hula speaker who was born and raised in Kapari and Viriolo villages and who worked as the Pacific Librarian in the Menzies Library of ANU, Canberra. We hear back from Roge and Gulea Kila who share musical responses to the 1904 recordings; a re-enactment of a Leku Leku song, and a stunning Ate Ate song of lament. All three guests express the value of archival recordings for descendants, connecting the past with contemporary relevance and contributing to cultural continuity.