MEDIA RELEASE

Free urban music workshops for Fijian-Australian youth

Released 25 July 2007

Information and Cultural Exchange
PO Box 4033 Parramatta NSW 2124 Australia
T: +61(2) 9897 5744 / F: +61(2) 9897 5766

The Western Sydney arts organisation, Information and Cultural Exchange (ICE) has teamed up with Fijian-Australian youth organisation, Fiji Youth Initiative (FYI), to run an exciting series of urban music workshops starting in August.

The workshops will enable passionate young people from the Fijian-Australian community to develop their lyric-writing and music production skills.

FYI is a new organisation made up of volunteers from the Fijian-Australian community who are committed to working with young people and providing opportunities to improve their quality of life.

ICE Director, Lena Nahlous, is excited about the partnership between ICE and FYI. “One of our aims at ICE is to assist seed organisations to become self-sufficient. We are looking forward to working with FYI to deliver an urban music program tailored to the needs of the Fijian-Australian community.”

The FYI music workshops target 15-25 year-olds from the Fijian-Australian community. To be eligible, participants must live in Western Sydney. The course will run every Saturday from 4 August to 15 September 2007, 12–4pm, at ICE’s Switch Multimedia and Digital Arts Access Centre in Granville.

The course is coordinated and led by famous hip-hop artist MC Trey who has been supported by the Vodafone Australia Foundation since 2006 to run urban music programs at ICE.

Trey, herself a member of the Fijian-Australian community, explains that the course will encourage participants to “express themselves through song and to discuss, research and write about issues that affect them and their peers. There will also be youth and health workers available to shed light on these issues.”

FYI will also bring on board established musicians from the Fijian-Australian community to tutor and work alongside participants.