New music from late Australian indigenous singer Gurrumul

New music from world-renowned Australian Aboriginal singer Gurrumul will be released next month, his record label said, with one album already completed as part of a documentary.


The singer, who was born blind and never gave any interviews, passed away on Tuesday after a long battle with illness aged 46.

He won international acclaim for his music, selling more than half a million albums worldwide, despite the fact that he performed in the Gumatj dialect, which is understood only by around 3,000 people.

He was hailed for having the “voice of an angel” and his career included collaborations with the likes of Elton John and Sting.

“There’s an album that has been finished. We’ve been waiting on it for a while,” Skinnyfish Music Australia managing director Mark Grose told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation late Wednesday.

“It forms part of the documentary that’s coming to the Melbourne Film Festival.

“There is more music, there’s no doubt about that. We’ve got at least one or two albums. One is completely finished, and one was being worked on.”

The singer, whose full name is Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu, was born on Elcho Island off the coast of Australia’s Northern Territory and taught himself how to play the guitar, launching a hugely successful career.

But he reportedly struggled with liver and kidney disease through contracting Hepatitis B as a child.

Aborigines, whose cultures stretch back tens of thousands of years, remain the most disadvantaged Australians, and have significantly shorter life expectancy than their fellow citizens.

Under Aboriginal custom, the publication of images of a recently deceased person is prohibited.

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