World-famous Aboriginal performer Mandawuy Yunupingu, best known as the lead singer in the band Yothu Yindu, is heading a national project to archive and preserve every genre of Australia’s Indigenous music and dance.

Aboriginal traditional music, which has historically been considered vital to Indigenous life and a way to remember one’s roots, is disappearing in many Aboriginal communities. Important spiritual and social messages from historical tribal leaders are no longer being heard, or in some cases are being distorted from traditional forms into more modern forms.

Mr Yunupingu explained that there are many cases where senior elders die and younger Indigenous generations either have no access, or little interest in sacred songs, initiation rites and traditional ceremonial music and dances.

This loss of spiritual messages in the music is leaving many Aboriginal people questioning their tribal and individual roles, both in the Aboriginal community and often in disorientated dealings with modern day life.

Alan Marett, Professor of Musicology at Melbourne University, is leading the team with Mr Yunupingu. “The first thing we need to do is to actually identify the most endangered traditions, and the way that we’re doing that is we’re simply being told by the people on the ground,” Professor Marett told the ABC.

“It’s hard to put a figure on it, but I would’ve thought that we’ve probably lost about 95 per cent of the musical traditions in the country”, he said.

“People are aware of Indigenous visual arts,” he explained, “but people are very unaware of music, and of course music and dance and the performative arts lie at the center of Indigenous knowledge systems.”

Mandawuy Yunupingu believes the project will provide further links and foster cultural understandings between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people.

“I would think that many non-Indigenous people would want a part of Aboriginal culture, that they would want to learn about it” Mr Yunupingu said.

Mr Yunupingu certainly has credibility in this area. His internationally-acclaimed band, Yothu Yindi, is composed of both Yolngu (Aboriginal) and Balanda (non-Aboriginal) musicians who perform a mix of Aboriginal and contemporary music.

The Australian Government named Mr Yunupingu ‘Australian of the Year’ in 1992, for being “an outstanding ambassador for Aboriginal people and their achievements and for Australia as a whole” and for his role in “building bridges of understanding between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people”.