Briony Luttrell

Research Background
Australian Universities are seeking to embed First Nations knowledges and practices into curriculum (Dianati & Bolt 2025). The approaches that Australian universities implement “Indigenisation” are varied (p. 1, 2025). One publicly visible way to demonstrate cultural collaboration with First Nations peoples would be to replace the academic procession music, “The Prince of Denmark’s March”, previously used at UniSC. This music is often used in film and television to signify pageantry or British heritage (Le Huray & Day, 2011). This work sought to discover ways to challenge the customs of the academic procession by the composition of a new ceremonial piece for a multi-campus university, led by First Nations Elder Uncle Kevin Starkey.

Research Contribution
Uncle Kevin extensively consulted with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities across the country, to compose “Oro Yarta Milyarra”, meaning Northwind Country Ceremony. After a monologue, the work opens with a wullwora (bull-roarer) specifically created for the composition and recorded at an abandoned train tunnel for its acoustics. Uncle Gordon Browning performed a pre-colonisation yidaki (digeridoo) and modern replica yidakis, and the addition of clap sticks and Torres Strait drums represent many ceremonial practices across Australia. The work was recorded by the music faculty at UniSC in the K1 studios and on location. This project incorporates Aboriginal and Torres Strait ceremonial practices to mark the handing down of knowledge and connect graduands to ancient knowledge holders of the past.

Research Significance
“Oro Yarta Milyarra”, commissioned by the Vice Chancellor, is played at the commencement of every UniSC graduation ceremony since September 2024. Media coverage of this significant change to the graduation ceremony included local ABC radio, The National Indigenous Times, and the UniSC website.

SOUNDPLAYSTILL is a one hour recorded soundtrack work of sonic sensory play, comprising of two movements. It was commissioned for STILL an immersive one night only artistic experience showcasing 40 new artworks of Australian artist John Wren. The sold-out event was held on Thursday 23rd May 2024 at Superordinary in Brisbane, QLD. Movement 1 is 30 minutes long and accompanies the pre-show section of the event. Movement 2 is 24 minutes long and accompanies the catwalk section of the event.

Movement 1 credits: Briony Luttrell, Andy Ward, and Simon Kindt.

Movement 2 credits: Briony Luttrell and Andy Ward.

Archaeopteryx is an EP by band Nonsemble, composed by Chris Perren.

Role: string recording supervisor, string editor. 

Full credits and more info: https://nonsemble.bandcamp.com/album/archaeopteryx

Archaeopteryx is a cycle of compositions for live strings and electronics, inspired by huge prehistoric birds. Chugging downbows, ethereal harmonic textures, and delicate pizzicato are nestled within lush synthesized textures and warm, thudding electronic percussion, exploring an expansive and totally unique soundworld.

Each movement is named after a species. Pelagornis, an ancient seabird with a 6m wingspan, the 3m-tall flightless “terror bird” Phorusrhacos, and others, including the eponymous Archaeopteryx, the earliest known bird. These long-extinct majestic winged creatures, known only through incomplete fossils, scientific descriptions and drawings, evoke a sense of transcendence and mystery which flows through this music.

The story of this music begins in live performance, with motifs emerging and evolving slowly over many performances. As Nonsemble experimented with combining strings with dynamic live electronics, Archaeopteryx was honed and refined into the evocative and organic body of work presented in this recording.

Performed by Nonsemble plus guest musicians.

World premiere Aug 18th 2022 for the Live at UQ Concert Series. 

A Horse is a Horse was inspired by the idea of chaperoning as an act of care. Care for a performer, for an audience, for our molecules. Things that help us into the next moment, or proteins that help us to put together or break apart tiny pieces of ourselves in ways that don’t result in nonfunctional structures. Potentially, as a result, this piece never gets anywhere because it’s too busy going somewhere. It would not have been possible without the creative chaperones in my life.

Commissioned by Dots+Loops to create 5 string quartet arrangements for Yalanji musician Deline Briscoe for a live performance at Dots+Loops: Nonstop 2022 Festival on Dec 18^th 2022 at The Tivoli Brisbane, Qld. Live performance featured Deline Briscoe, Poji, and Ensemble Cherubim.

Dots & Loops Nonstop Festival 2022 was assisted by: the Australian Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body; Queensland Government through Arts Queensland; Creative Partnerships Australia through the Australian Cultural Fund; and our partners Cre8tive Nations, The Constance Hotel Fortitude Valley, the Weekend Edition, the University of Queensland School of Music, and Simply for Strings.

In our visually dominant society, listening to the state of changing ecosystems can connect people at an embodied sensory level and inspire action (Gilmurray, 2017). Acidification is a collaborative soundscape for cello and electronics that explores acidification, extinction and the urgent need for interdisciplinary action (Gordon et al., 2017) in the conservation and protection of the Great Barrier Reef. The work draws on ecoacoustic hydrophone (underwater) recordings submerging listeners in the sonic environment of this diverse and fragile ecosystem. The recordings document death and ecotoxicity, and form part of an interdisciplinary research project designed to explore sound as a measure for health and call to action in ecological crisis.

The climate crisis and anthropogenic impact continues to cause profound damage to the Great Barrier Reef. This project builds on a large body of work to extend and expand current methods for working with environmental data and experimental music collaborations involving intuitive and visceral improvisations. Acidification is inspired by the destruction and devastation of natural ecosystems. The cello improvisation responded to the timbral qualities of the reef recordings and focussed on advancing new methods for collaboration and extended performance techniques. The resulting collaborative methods are developing new knowledge for creative practitioners to apply creative skillsets to ethical and interdisciplinary collaborations responding to climate change.

Acidification was invited as a featured performance at the national symposium Returning to the Gothic Ocean in February 2021, and the international festival BEAST in April 2021, one of the largest international gatherings for electroacoustic music. The success of the performances has resulted in invitations for an international keynote, a co-authored chapter in an upcoming anthology of papers published by Manchester University Press, and multiple festival invitations.

DIÁLOGOS is an acoustic dialogue with a Eucalyptus tree created for the international symposium DIÁLOGOS ~ MENTE DE LAS :|: DAS PLANTAS. The work is based on a recording from the perspective of a Eucalyptus tree on Kabi Kabi Country on the Sunshine Coast. Hydrophones were planted at the roots of the tree recording the sonic environment and Monica Gagliano's voice while she read excerpts from her book 'Thus Spoke the Plant' through the tree. Cellist Briony Luttrell improvised live responses to the sonic environment and added further dialogue with the processed Eucalyptus recordings.

DIÁLOGOS is inspired by Thus Spoke the Plant in transcending the view of plants as the objects of scientific materialism, and encouraging us to rethink plants as beings with subjectivity, consciousness, and volition, and hence having the capacity for their own perspectives, voices and dialogues. This project is part of an emerging portfolio of interdisciplinary research at USC Sunshine Coast exploring the role of sound in regeneration and ecological interconnection.

This soundscape is created as a prelude to the participatory photography session where delegates are encouraged to go outside and take photos of plants to contribute towards a global photography map that extends on the participatory photography research led by Tricia King.

DIÁLOGOS ~ MENTE DE LAS :|: DAS PLANTAS is an international symposium hosted on July 8th 2021 on the Arts Front platform that focuses on Latin American contributions from the forthcoming book The Mind of Plants www.themindofplants.com/ The symposium features stories, reflections, images and sounds about our relationship with plants. The event is generously supported by the Templeton World Charity Foundation, Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT), and Centro de Estudos Sociais, Universidade de Coimbra.

In our visually dominant society, listening to the state of changing ecosystems can connect people at an embodied sensory level and inspire action (Gilmurray, 2017). Acidification is a collaborative soundscape for cello and electronics that explores acidification, extinction and the urgent need for interdisciplinary action (Gordon et al., 2017) in the conservation and protection of the Great Barrier Reef. The work draws on ecoacoustic hydrophone (underwater) recordings submerging listeners in the sonic environment of this diverse and fragile ecosystem. The recordings document death and ecotoxicity, and form part of an interdisciplinary research project designed to explore sound as a measure for health and call to action in ecological crisis.

The climate crisis and anthropogenic impact continues to cause profound damage to the Great Barrier Reef. This project builds on a large body of work to extend and expand current methods for working with environmental data and experimental music collaborations involving intuitive and visceral improvisations. Acidification is inspired by the destruction and devastation of natural ecosystems. The cello improvisation responded to the timbral qualities of the reef recordings and focussed on advancing new methods for collaboration and extended performance techniques. The resulting collaborative methods are developing new knowledge for creative practitioners to apply creative skillsets to ethical and interdisciplinary collaborations responding to climate change.

Acidification was invited as a featured performance at the national symposium Returning to the Gothic Ocean in February 2021, and the international festival BEAST in April 2021, one of the largest international gatherings for electroacoustic music. The success of the performances has resulted in invitations for an international keynote, a co-authored chapter in an upcoming anthology of papers published by Manchester University Press, and multiple festival invitations.

Annihilation is an immersive sound installation that embodies the anxiety of the present and likely futures of the Great Barrier Reef. It is the second in a trilogy of works which explore an interdisciplinary approach to sound as measure for biodiversity and affective call to action. Hydrophone (underwater) recordings of the reef are played through stringed instruments with transducers and augmented by improvised responses allowing them to amplify and translate the sounds of the reef into a familiar emotive auralities. This installation work connects cultural symbols of powerful but abstracted affect with the reality of destruction, death, and imminent annihilation of global underwater ecosystems.

Commissioned for, and premiered at, Restrung Festival at Metro Arts in Brisbane, Australia (14-16 October 2021).