William Barton To Be Awarded For Distinguished Services To Australian Music

William Barton has been announced as the latest recipient of the illustrious Richard Gill Award for Distinguished Services to Australian Music, which he’ll receive at the 2023 Art Music Awards later this month.

The ceremony will take place at Carriageworks on Eveleigh/Gadigal land (Sydney), going down on Tuesday August 15. Presented by APRA AMCOS and the Australian Music Centre, the award has previously been endowed to Nigel Butterley (2022), Penny Lomax and Maureen Cooney (2021), Ros Bandt (2020) and The Necks (2019). Barton will be the first Indigenous recipient of the award.

In a statement shared with the news, Barton (who was recently interviewed by The Music) said of the honour: “This award to me, it means the world. It is presented to me by my colleagues, by my peers - the musical foundations across Australia. With the intention of this award being given back to my community, I share with them the success of my journey. Not only my Kalkadungu nation, but all nations across Australia and the world.

“It’s important to be reflective on the journey and also acknowledge all the Aunties and Uncles and Grandmas and Grandfathers who help create a safe space for artists such as myself to be a composer in the Western world and give me and others that strong foundation of country and how we interpret the language of the landscape with the sonic force of a symphony orchestra – like the kangaroo sinew of strength, also nurturing the fragility between two worlds.”

Barton will also perform at the 2023 Art Music Awards, sharing the stage with violinist Veronique Serret, bassist Sam Anning, cellist Matthew Hoy and his mother, Aunty Delmae Barton. 

This upcoming award joins a growing list of accolades given to Barton in recent times; at the end of last year, for example, he was formally named the Queensland Australian Of The Year, as well as a nominee for Australian Of The Year. In 2021, too, he received the Don Banks Music Award.

Barton has thus far released 11 studio albums, the most recent of which being Heartland (a collaborative effort with Serret that arrived last July) and History Has A Heartbeat (another joint effort, this one with Joseph Tawadros, which arrived last August).