Composer, violist and conductor Aaron Wyatt has been named as the recipient of the Australian Academy of the Humanities’ 2026 John Mulvaney Fellowship.

The Noongar musician will travel to New Norcia in Western Australia to access a collection of Indigenous musical materials held by the town’s monastery. In collaboration with the local community, Wyatt will use these to develop a major new composition to be premiered in 2027.

Aaron Wyatt. Photo © Jessica Bader Photography

“The composition I develop in New Norcia will feature field recordings from the site and incorporate Indigenous musical themes first transcribed and arranged in the 19th century by Rosendo Salvado, a Benedictine monk who founded the monastery,” said Aaron. “Their reclamation and recontextualisation will invite listeners to contemplate the way in which traditional Indigenous music has often been reshaped for its inclusion in more rigid, Western forms.”

Wyatt’s works have been performed by the Canberra, Melbourne and West Australian symphony orchestras, the Melbourne Chamber Orchestra, the Australian Music Centre and Ensemble Offspring, among others. A member of Decibel New Music, he developed the Decibel ScorePlayer, an iPad app which allows for the playback of graphic scores....