Reconciliation Week to be celebrated with First Nations performance Songbird

A special show to recognise and celebrate Reconciliation Week 2024 will be hosted in Bunbury with a performance written by First Nations creative Shakara Walley. Songbird is a Yirra Yaakin Theatre Company performance set to be hosted at the Bunbury Regional Entertainment Centre with original songs written by Walley and family members. With Walley having written the show at 27 years old, the cast and crew is made up of creatives the same age or younger. Walley said she felt like giving back to fellow artists in the First Nations community. “They’re all around the same age I was when I wrote it. It’s like passing the baton,” she said. An intimate tale of heartbreak, forgiveness, shared memories and sweet melodies, Songbird is a story about a young couple named Leon and Brooke. They part ways following the death of Brooke’s brother with the trio growing up together and being inseparable until his untimely death, which drove Brooke and Leon apart. But, re-connection is in the air. “I just wanted it to be a realistic hour-long conversation. It’s a sad tale but there’s elements of comedy in it and there’s singing,” Walley said. Artistic director of Yirra Yaakin Theatre Company Maitland Schnaars said the story was set in a country town. “It actually explores why some people stay in country towns, why some people leave. It explores can people reconnect after a tragedy?” he said. “I grew up in a small country town myself, and when I grew up there, we got nothing. I like taking the theatre to regional areas. “It shows that there’s other pathways for country people — there’s other things we can do other than just sport. There’s career pathways within the arts, which if you don’t see that, you don’t know about those pathways.” Schnaars said to him, reconciliation meant acknowledging the past to move forward and creating harmony with Indigenous and non-Indigenous experiences. “The actors are Indigenous, it’s actually a universal story. It’s just looking at it through our eyes, it’s not specifically Indigenous, it’s actually a country story,” he said. “There’s differences between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australia but there’s also a lot of similarities.” BREC executive director Fiona de Garis said it was an important performance to bring to Bunbury. “Reconciliation Week is a time for all Australians to learn about our shared histories, cultures and achievements. How better to do that than through sharing local First Nations stories through theatre,” she said. Songbird will take to the BREC stage on June 1, with tickets on sale now.