The Technology, Aesthetics and Cultural Politics of a Collaborative, Transnational Music Recording Project: Veiga, Veiga and the Itinerant Overdubs

Abstract

This article describes and analyses the aesthetic, technological and cultural processes informing the cultural production of ‘Veiga, Veiga’ a song recorded by 73-year-old Australian Torres Strait Islander, Henry (Seaman) Dan. The song in its ‘final’ version appears on his CD Perfect Pearl recorded and released in 2003. However, achieving that version required considerable collaboration, but often at-a-distance, between songwriters, musicians and producers based in Australia (Cairns, Sydney and Thursday Island) and Papua New Guinea (Port Moresby). The main foci here are the process of collaboration and also the assumptions and challenges of cultural production. It discusses the essential use of multi-track digital recording software to the recording of ‘Veiga, Veiga’. In the multi-track musical recording process used to produce the song, primarily Protools™ software, the relatively new technology was used to good effect to facilitate trans-national and cross-cultural collaboration.