This month Deadly Vibe again goes north to Brisbane and talks to Christine Howes from radio 4AAA about the recent Barambah Beltout Festival.
1997 was the fourth year the Barambah Beltout Festival was staged in the Cherbourg community. Running from Monday 7 April until Saturday May 3, the festival of multicultural music and dance featured a young talent show, rock bands,
traditional music and country and western music as well as fashion parade and art exhibition. Sponsored by Daki Budtcha and assisted by the Australia Council, the Barambah Beltout Festival was again a huge success attracting more than700 people.
Anyone interested in knowing more about the Barambah Beltout Festival or participating next year can contact the festival office direct at PO Box 3261 South Brisbane.
Deadly Vibe: I am catching up with Christine Howes from 4AAA in Brisbane about the recent Barambah Beltout Festival held in the Cherbourg Community. So how was the festival Christine?
4AAA: it was fantastic. The spirit of the festival was unreal and everybody had a really great time. There was all good music and a fashion parade and everything just went really great.
Deadly Vibe: You had quite a focus on youth this year I noticed. There were a lot more young people involved in like the fashion parade and so forth.
A444: And the Karate demonstration. I tell you some kids must have been five or six years old kicking up into the air and striding through the hall and punching the air everyone was just so impressed with these kids.
Deadly Vibe: It is just fantastic because it is such an unusual sport for Aboriginal children to become involved in.
4AAA: Yes I think so and I think it has been going for a good three or four years. It has done a lot for the community to have something out there like the Barambah Beltout Festival that anybody and everybody can get involved in.
Deadly Vibe: Is this around Mergon or whereabouts are the karate kids from?
A444: They are all Cherbourg kids and the teacher was a Cherbourg man, it was totally a community thing.
Deadly Vibe: Maroochy Barambah and her husband Ade have had quite an influence on the festival in the last couple of years. Did they have much of a role this year?
A444: Ade was moving faster than Greece Lightening from one end of the festival to the other and the question on everybody’s lips was always where’s Ade? Where’s Ade? So I think that they are both totally committed to the festival andAde plays a major organising role. We were lucky with the weather because there were showers coming in and on the Saturday afternoon just before the festival began itself. So for a while there it was fingers crossed.
Deadly Vibe: How important would you say a festival like this is in particular areas?
A444: I think it is incredibly important because it really shows these kids and the rest of the community what they can do and what they are capable of and they are capable of a tremendous amount. To see how excited these kids are and how professionally they handle themselves like in the fashion parade and the musicians that were playing up there on stage.
Deadly Vibe: Who were some of the musicians that you had?
A444: There was the Serenity Band they actually are a band from Brisbane I understand. A few of them have got family in Cherbourg and they have been together for four years. One of them told me that they never practice they just play at festivals and things. To me they just sounded fantastic for people who don’t practice.
I think they need to get it together a bit more and theyt need to get it together a bit more and they could really go a long way and Ade has spotted them hopefully we will be hearing a bit more about them.
Deadly Vibe: If you are local and you are a Murri and you are living up around the Cherbourg area and you want to be involved in next year’s Beltout how do you go about it?
A444: Well I guess the best person to contact is Ade and his number is 07 38467722. They are always looking for local people to become involved.
Deadly Vibe: That’s fantastic we wish organisers every success for more Beltout.
Comments are closed.