The Dharug composer has won an inaugural national grant to help promote the work of Indigenous composers in Australia.

The Australian National University’s Dr Christopher Sainsbury has been awarded the Australasian Performing Rights Association’s inaugural national Indigenous Composer Grant to help promote the work of Indigenous composers in Australia. The grant is part of APRA’s Indigenous Composers Initiative, which provides emerging Indigenous composers with the chance to be mentored by established composers, to craft original works and to have their music showcased.

Sainsbury, a member of the Dharug nation, held a full-time position at Eora College in Redfern, Sydney for 25 years as both a music teacher and Head of Arts and Media, supervising numerous courses in music, theatre, screen studies and Aboriginal Arts. It was during his tenure at Eora College that he identified the need that sparked the idea for this project. “In that setting, I realised there were a lot of Aboriginal musicians who could potentially be composers in a broader sense,” he said. “Many were sort of skirting around the edge, or actually engaged in new music through the music they were doing for film and theatre.”

The grant is valued at $26,000 and will be...