Gurrumul

A blind Gumatj man from Elcho Island in northern Australia, Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu straddled the ancient and modern worlds with astonishing grace and an uncannily clear, comforting high tenor voice. Born in 1971, Gurrumul had become Australia's most commercially successful Aboriginal musician by the time of his death of liver and kidney failure, in 2017. (He provides his own autobiography in the song "Gurrumul History.") While initially rooted in his tight yet segregated community as a member of the popular Indigenous groups Yothu Yindi and the Saltwater Band, Gurrumul achieved international success with his self-titled 2008 solo debut, the best-selling Indigenous music album in Australian history. With the help of producer/arranger Michael Hohnen, Gurrumul framed his different personas in releases like The Gospel Album, featuring the Christian hymns he sang as a child, and the ambitious, posthumously released Djarimirri (Child of the Rainbow), containing orchestral arrangements of traditional Yolngu Aboriginal music.