ABSTRACT
This chapter contextualizes the theme of settler music-making within the sights and sounds of the developing colonial city. This is a city whose original indigenous peoples were pushed to the margins as the British expanded into new territories, seeking land and exports. Early colonial efforts were directed at coalmining, leading to the growth of a city whose mining continues today. After the closure of a penal colony in 1822, the area was opened to settlers and the city gradually expanded. In the late 1850s mining ventures were established on the sites of profitable coal seams, leading to further immigration of skilled miners. In an age of travelogues replete with wonders, ordeals and oddities, migrant coalminers and their improvised settlements became objects of curiosity. Writing by journalists and travellers that often noted both natural and man-made sights and sounds also reported on (and objectified) the coalminer at home and work. In spite of their satirical tone and at times questionable motives, these writings supply details that allow for a rich account of sensory impressions of the various locations and musical sites, as well as the people who lived there. Referring firstly to the sounds of the natural environment, increasingly overlaid by industrial noise, the chapter follows the threads and traces of colonial music-making as it developed and grew with the expansion of settlements.
