Michael Farah

EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW:      Michael Farah "Michael Farah is bringing dance and a positive message to parts of Australia you're never likely to see." Written by Alexander Cork 2011

After 30 hours of travel, three flights and $3000, Michael Farah waited for his 6.30pm beginner salsa students in the shed of a far-flung West Australian cattle station. 7.00pm came and went and the Elders of the Indigenous community that Michael had invited to the class were nowhere to be seen. The burning sun sunk slowly below the horizon and Michael was about to call off the class. “At 7.30pm I was ready to pack up and 50 Aboriginal people walk through the door – about 25 men, and 25 women – exact amounts. Straight up cowboys, bowed legs and all. I was like, ‘Oh my god, how am I going to do this?’' Michael started the class with the same words of advice that have guided him throughout his dancing career and have become characteristic of his approach teaching: “This is just about having fun, this isn’t about getting it right. And when we can all let go of getting it right, then we’re going to learn something.” The class was an instant success. “Feet were going everywhere! There was no 1, 2, 3 but who cares? We did that on Tuesday, and by Thursday I had to change venue because we had about 65 people come.” The story of the West Australian cattle station salsa lesson is one of Michael’s personal favourites amongst many to have come out of his time teaching for the Anti-Racism Action Band (A.R.A.B) established in 2001, being co-director of Katumba Latin Entertainment and co-founding the Indigenous Hip Hop Project (IHHP) in 2004. For Michael, a career in dance is a blessing he thought would never come. Enamoured with hip-hop through his teens, Michael fell into the life of a family man when he was only 20 years old. “Pretty much all I did was work in hospitality and try and look after my family,” he said. At age 28 after a divorce and with two sons to looks after, Michael started to dance again and was approached to teach hip-hop at a friend’s dance school despite admitting he knew nothing about teaching.  “Her students absolutely loved it”, Michael said, “There was a craving for something different besides jazz, tap and ballet... Before I knew it I was teaching about 25 dance classes a week.” A chance meeting on a plane with break dancer Dion Brownfield was the catalyst for the IHHP. Dion had contact with a community in the Kimberleys and after seeing Michael teach, asked him and his son to work at the community. A one week project turned into six weeks and the IHHP was born. IHHP now employs up to 40 artists to teach dance in remote communities. Many of the visits are funded by organisations wanting to reach Indigenous communities. “We have about 60 different collaborations from schools to STI programs to non-smoking, anything got to do with health or education or physical education, that’s what we get used for,” Michael said. Michael believes the project is achieving beyond what anyone thought possible. “It’s a fantastic thing, it’s an amazing thing. We’re calling upon more artists, we’re calling upon more funding because it’s just this massive snowball and we can’t even keep up right now.” Since February this year, the IHHP has visited 50 communities for one week programs with many communities being visited multiple times. If you’d like to know more about the IHHP, A.R.A.B or Katumba Latin Entertainment, please visit their respective websites.