Australia Council Funding Attacked By Champion Musician

Acclaimed violinist Jon Rose has attacked the Australia Council's distribution of funds to the music industry in a recent keynote speech.

Rose, who has been commissioned by the Kronos String Quartet and been featured at CarriageWorks and Mona Foma, and who was awarded the Council's top accolade, the Don Banks Music Award in 2012, spoke at Melbourne's Wheeler Centre mid-July and the transcript has now appeared online. Offering six problems with the current live music landscape, Rose signalled out the Council's perceived lean towards classical music and “nineteenth-century high art forms in expensive big buildings”.

Rose said that figures he'd sourced for 2010 music funding put the total amount at $84.7 million, “of which $72.4 million goes straight to the orchestras and opera, uncontested by any register of music peers.

“The rest (that's all other music practice of any genre in Australia) fight over the remaining $5.7 million,” he said, “which is competitively administered through the Music Board. According to the Music Board, that's set in stone for the next ten years, short of a revolution. Even if you add to this basic regime the funding of the various states, the balance doesn't change: it remains seriously warped.”

The Music Board, which is Chaired by Dr Matthew Hindson AM, features musicians such as Nick Bomba, who has played as part of the John Butler Trio, Deborah Conway and indigenous singer/songwriter Shellie Morris.

“It reminds us that the aesthetic preferences of the ruling classes of the late nineteenth century are still largely the dominant code of the cultural power elite in the twenty-first century,” Rose claimed. “Why should the ruling culture of the late nineteenth century hold such sway in the twenty-first century? If we're going to do historical spectacle, why stop at the nineteenth? Why not do the first century? Wheel in a few gladiators, lions and Christians, and restore the coliseums around the world to their traditional functionality?

“If music is promoted and experienced as heritage instead of a volatile, ever-changing contemporaneous medium, it will always be on the back foot, defending its position and preserving its status and privilege. To remain sustainable as art, music must be renewed and transformed every day.”

Australia Council CEO Tony Grybowski told theMusic.com.au that the Council has already identified concerns raised by Rose.

“Jon is a highly respected artist and leader in the music sector and this was clearly recognised when the Australia Council awarded him the 2012 Australia Council Don Banks Music Award, Australia's most valuable music prize,” he said.

“The Australia Council Review of 2012 acknowledged some of the issues he has raised, and the National Cultural Policy supported the recommendations of the Review and provided an additional $60 million over four years for competitively administered grants and programs offered by the Australia Council. We have already seen an immediate effect of that extra funding in our latest annual Program grants round.

"The new governing Board of the Australia Council will be considering the longer term distribution of the new budget allocation in coming months. In line with the Review of the Australia Council and the recent commencement of our modernised Act, we are also working through improvements to our grant-giving models.”

Last week the Australia Council announced that they had awarded over $1.4 million in music grants in the preceding few months. Music organisations Music Victoria, QMusic, WAM and Music NT received Annual Program grants, while the Cosmic Psychos and Glass Towers received International Pathways grants to tour the US and UK respectively.

The team of peers who consulted on the grants included musicians Conway and fellow Music Board member Lawrence English, as well as Holly Throsby and industry professionals Luke Logemann and Jane Slingo.

Paul Mason, the Australia Council's Director Music and Early Career Artists, added to theMusic, “Over the past few years the range and reach of the work we've funded has increased massively, reflecting the diversity of contemporary music making.

"Those results include the funding of Elefant Traks in our recent Recording Initiative, our Nashville Songwriter Residency and the most recent results, announced last week, funding organisations as diverse as Songlines, the Goldner String Quartet and Music Victoria. But of course music is a big and dynamic part of Australian culture, and there are always more great projects than we're able to support.”

Last year the Australia Council's funding habits were the subject of controversy after it was revealed that classical music label Melba was receiving millions a year from the government with minimal return. Their funding was cut following the scandal.

In his speech Rose also took aim at red tape, complaining residents and the internet as hindrances to live music. Read the transcript here.