Every work of art is shaped not only by its creator, but by the shifting frame of events in which it is made.

For composer and proud Yorta Yorta woman Deborah Cheetham Fraillon, this has never been more apparent than in the evolving life of her opera Parrwang Lifts the Sky, which is about to be revived at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, where (Professor) Cheetham Fraillon is the Elizabeth Todd Chair of Vocal Studies.

Parrwang’s premiere (a Short Black Opera and Victorian Opera co-production) took place in Melbourne during the COVID lockdowns in 2021, which led to it being videoed and streamed rather than witnessed by a live audience. Since then it has been performed twice (in 2023 and 2024) in a period in part defined by a sometimes divisive campaign leading up to the 2023 Indigenous Voice Referendum and its subsequent rejection by the Australian electorate.

This latest revival by the Sydney Conservatorium of Music will be revealed in the immediate aftermath of a federal election – one in which First Nations Welcome to Country ceremonies became a political football.

“I think that, like the historic operas of the Western canon – which have endured and evolved through many geopolitical...