Archie Roach AM
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Archie Roach AM
Archie Roach is a man of few words but when he speaks or sings those words resonate with your soul. A proud Gunditjmara/Bundjalung man, he is one of Australia’s most treasured performers.
When his debut album Charcoal Lane was released in 1990, the impact was immediate. The album’s centrepiece, ‘Took The Children Away’, shone a spotlight on the impact of the forcible removal of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children from their families. The single won an international Human Rights Achievement Award, the first ever awarded for a song. It was added to the National Film and Sound Archive in Canberra, acknowledging its significance in Australian cultural and social history.
Archie has released a further eight acclaimed albums, toured internationally with icons such as Leonard Cohen, Patti Smith, Rodriguez and Bob Dylan, and worked on the sound track for Rolf de Heer’s acclaimed film The Tracker.
Archie has won three ARIA Awards (with a further seven nominations) and eight Deadly Awards. He and his beloved Ruby Hunter won a 2005 Helpmann Award and a 2008 Sydney Myer Performing Arts Award. He has also received the Australia Council for the Arts 2011 Red Ochre Award, the 2015 Don Banks Award and the 2017 Centenary JC Williamson Award, which honours the work of practitioners who have made an outstanding contribution to the Australian live entertainment and performing arts industry and shaped the future of our industry for the better.
Off stage, Archie works with young people caught up in the criminal justice system and mentors young and emerging Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists. In 2015 he was made a Member of the Order of Australia for his services to music and his support of social justice.