Performing Arts
Maroochy Barambah
Maroochy Barambah
Maroochy Barambah (b. circa 1950) is an Australian Aboriginal mezzo-soprano singer. She is a song-woman, law-woman and elder of the Turrbal people. Maroochy Barambah was born Yvette Isaacs in the town of Cherboug in Queensland. During the 1970s Yvette was able to attend the Melba Conservatorium of Music on a scholarship and the Victorian College of Arts. She graduated in 1979. She went on to establish her own jazz group and in 1982 appeared in Episode 3 of the Women of the Sun historical drama series.
Yvette changed her name to Maroochy Barambah in 1982. Maroochy Barambah performed in the 1989 production of Black River—the first Aboriginal Australian to perform opera on stage—for the Sydney Metropolitican Opera, in the Bran Nue Dae musical the following year, and in 1991 “was awarded the inaugural Aboriginal performing arts fellowship by the Aboriginal Arts Committee.”