Performing at Four Winds is a unique experience, 2016 Easter Festival; image courtesy Four Winds
Australia is very fond of a festival – we have plenty of them. In regional areas in particular, festivals have grown exponentially over the past decade, driven by the growth of cultural tourism.
One of the first, and more successful, regional festivals has been Four Winds Bermagui.
A sleepy fishing town on the far South Coast of NSW, Bermagui’s residents have an average annual income of just $34,000. In 1991 a group of like-minded locals staged a musical soiree over the Easter Weekend, recognising that their town had far more to offer than just fishing.
Four Winds Bermagui is now a nationally and internationally recognised event, and in 2011 received the APRA/AMCOS Australian Art Music Award for Excellence in a Regional Location.
Strategist and former Chairperson for the organisation, Sheena Boughen explained: ‘Particular to our story is its transformation from being an event to being a well-organised event; a commitment to a set of values that think through the language of music to transform lives as well as communities.’
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In her role as Chair and pro bono CEO over the last ten years, Boughen lead an eclectic group who believe that the transformation of the event from a biennial festival into one of Australia’s most recognised music organisations would fulfil a national cultural need.
She was the driving force in attracting philanthropic support and grants to a total of $6 million over this period for capital and cultural projects, a position and passion that has been continued and extended by the current Four Winds team, including current Chair Michael Darling and Executive Director, David Francis.
Boughen continued: ‘We don’t feel disadvantaged being in the regions. In fact, I feel a little uncomfortable talking about regional arts because one of the issues that has been prominent for us was to see this as an opportunity and an advantage – not a disadvantage.’
It is a point that Artistic Director James Crabb agrees with. He will deliver Four Winds’ most ambitious program to date in 2018, bringing together more than 60 carefully selected artists and 10 ensembles for 26 performances across the festival’s five days.
Four Winds’ signature Sound Shell, 2016 Easter Festival; image courtesy Four Winds
How to grow a regional festival
Four Winds was – and has always been – committed to new work. While its pedigree grew over the years, Boughen said that after a while, ‘We asked ourselves what else do we need to be doing, and the “so what” question kept on coming up. In other words, it had to have relevance.
‘So after 15 years we decided to take music into the community. It seems obvious in retrospective, but we took it into the schools, onto the footy oval and particularly into the lives and hearts of the 1,572 people who lived in that town,’ she said.
‘The board then asked, “How do we go beyond good governance?” Let’s accelerate the way we can show our sense of stewardship and reach out to make a national impact.’
Boughen continued: ‘How could we let music encourage our audiences and community to make them curious about strangers to be comfortable and open to welcome people outside of those they knew?’
The answer was found in partnerships.
It’s a democratic music experience at Four Winds, where musicians, audiences, philanthropists and volunteers are blurred. View from 2016 Easter Festival; image courtesy Four Winds Bermagui
Let’s grow this together
The first port of call in partnering was the Australian National Academy of Music (ANAM) in Melbourne. Former Artistic Director, Paul Dean felt it was very important to get students out of their comfort zone. So in partnership with Four Winds, students come twice a year to spend four weeks in residence at Bermagui.
Boughen explained: ‘The Australian National Academy of Music is like the Australian Institute of Sport – they invite top emerging classical musicians to come for a minimum a year and give them extremely high-level, challenging experiences around performance.
‘Their participation through storytelling with music with our Indigenous community, with our school kids, and with the public through the council and libraries is a gift we give back to this community. The council gives us strong feedback in our region that does open people up to understand the power of participation in the arts and not just have a passive relationship.
‘We regard this as a deep and radical demonstration. We call it “active cultural citizenship”, with our footprint being an artistic, local, national and thought leadership community,’ said Boughen.
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But partnerships can also be more abstract. Boughen mentioned having Costa Georgiadis, the host of popular television program, Gardening Australia visit Four Winds.
‘A difficulty is how do you grow, deliver and give people a guide to something different than what they know? You have to look beyond your circle. When Costa was with us his use of social media let the world know we existed, and what he did with thousands of hits in a space of minutes got our message out.’
Boughen said that ABC Classic FM presenter Margaret Throsby has also been a long-time supporter, hosting conversations over the festival period.
‘These sorts of partnerships give us repeated exposure to artists and people like broadcasters, and is part of how we develop this ecosystem approach,’ she added. ‘Most of my work as chair was really leading a team to change this direction.’
Venue hire has also been a way to grow the organisation. Giving themselves the tag ‘Nature’s Concert Hall’, both Four Wind’s signature Sound Shell (designed by architect Philip Cox and with an audience capacity of 2,000) and the Windsong Pavilion (designed by architect Clinton Murray with world class acoustics, and with a space for 200 people) are programmed with events year round.
It is this slow momentum and investment that builds impact. Boughen recognised that while Four Winds today operates at a very different scale than its early days in the 1990s, the drive to be part of a national conversation has always been there.
‘How do you get to ask the important questions? What did a leap of faith mean to build a place? Audiences are way beyond ticket purchases, and we had to find out who they are, and what did they care about, and how we could bring them on the ride with us. This is how you get to build a nation,’ she said.
But the key to it all is not just the questions. ‘It is about building confidence not timidity,’ added Boughen. She also explained the necessity of dissolving the boundary lines between the locals, philanthropists, audience and volunteers.
‘Part of our story is connecting the communities who have always been there and see it as their place,’ she added.
Clearly, music has the power to transform entire communities, not just individuals.
Four Winds Bermagui will be held 28 March – 1 April 2018. Bermagui is located on the far south coast of NSW. For details visit fourwinds.com.au/easterfestival.
Sheena Boughen presented at last year’s Creative Regions National Summit at Parliament House, Canberra.
