After attending the International Indigenous Music Summit in Toronto last year, Australian musician Rob Edwards felt a pull he couldn’t ignore. The gathering, which brought together Indigenous artists from around the world, sparked in him a sense of kinship and belonging.
That feeling has led him to brave the Manitoba winter, where he will spend several weeks collaborating with local Indigenous artists and deepening his own cultural journey.
“On day one, I was just blown away by the community, and the coming together of so many different First Nations cultures,” said Edwards, during his stay in Winnipeg. ” The first day of the conference was out on the beach, and there was a welcome ceremony, and everybody did a welcome in their own language and way.” Edwards described the experience as grounding. It was there that he first felt the global threads tying Indigenous peoples together. “There’s something about it that I just don’t know the words to describe, but there’s a feeling of safety and home in that connection.”
Now in Canada, travelling from his home in Adelaide, South Australia, Edwards is beginning a community‑focused tour across the province, performing, collaborating, and seeking to learn from local artists and Elders. “I’m so excited to get out, explore Manitoba and meet more people. And I think that there’s such a desire learn, and I feel so drawn.”
Although he’s only been in Manitoa for a short time, Edwards has connected and met with several artists during his visit to Festival du Voyageur. On February 26, he will give a free performance at Fort Alexander, Sagkeeng Anicinabe High School, as part of his Manitoba winter tour. He said he is eager to visit and learn from as many people as he can.
“There’s so much I want to just experience. I just want to hear stories. I just want to meet people, and there’s something so similar. The aunties, they’re all the same. And the Elders, there’s this beautiful similarity, but I just. Yeah, I’m just so ready to meet more people.”
On this journey, Edwards said he will learn as much about others as he will learn about himself—especially his Indigeneity.
Edwards has been surrounded by music as long as he can remember. Banging on counters and enthuiastically strumming on his father’s guitar. It was from this passion and potential that his family enrolled him in guitar lessons. “Every Monday after school, mum would drive me, pick me up and drive me to guitar lessons. And it was hard, you know, but she just kept supporting and pushing. Sometimes, she bribed me with a bag of chips on the way.”
Those lessons would become a grounding force after his years working as a paramedic in Australia, where he struggled with PTSD. “It was hard, and I committed so much of my life to that. But I fell into music as a coping mechanism.” Although a job to earn money at first, he said it became an emotional processing tool of writing and playing songs of what was heavy on his heart. It was then that he would write about his own experiences with identity and the legacy of Australia’s Stolen Generations. His great‑grandmother was forcibly removed from her family and community, leaving Edwards’s family searching for their history and cultural roots.
“We lost our connection to our country, our culture, our community and our tribe.” His song “Searching” was written about that loss and the ongoing journey of piecing together that family history. “Some days it’s just harder than others. I deal with imposter syndrome a lot. You know, I’m definitely like the fair-skinned. I fall in between the two, and there are so many of us, like that. So we talk about walking those two worlds of Indigenous and not.”
From his first visit to the International Indigenous Music Summit in Toronto to his return to Canada, Edwards is driven to learn more. To learn from First Nation, Métis, and Inuit communities and their Elders about the histories of discrimination and racism, but more importantly, the stories of resilience and generations supporting each other. He said he hopes to bring what he learns in Treaty One home, to inspire and encourage others there.
His upcoming single, “Astronaut,” born from recent travels and unexpected connections, represents a shift in himself. “When you meet someone, or you meet people, and then you don’t know the role that they play. And how many forks in your story along the way, and in which direction is it going to go? For so long, a lot of my music has been leaning into a space of pain and expressing it. And I really, for the first time in a while, was like, I’m just going to focus on some joy.”
As he prepares to step into more Manitoba communities, Edwards hopes others will follow their own callings toward passion and identity. “The currency of creativity is time. And it’s worth it.”
– Ryan Funk, U Multicultural
