Emma Donovan and The Putbacks performing at 2022 Port Fairy Folk Festival

Hear her earliest memories of performing, the strong women in her life and how motherhood has changed her approach to music in our new series, The Folkie Podcast.

"I'm looking forward to getting back to the Port Fairy Folk Festival," Donovan said. "We did it a few years back but this return I think it's going to be special.

"It's a huge pleasure to play for that community."

Donovan is best known for her work with The Putbacks and The Black Arm Band project. She has also toured and recorded with Archie Roach and Ruby Hunter, Spinifex Gum, Christine Anu, Yothu Yindi, Jimmy Little and Paul Kelly among others.

"Over the years folk has moved and changed," Donovan said. "For a band like myself in a funk-soul outfit I still feel comfortable in that genre.

"There's a wider and more diverse bands and sounds under that kind of folk."

Donovan started her singing career at age seven, appearing in family band The Donovans.

The Donovans included church song renditions with Emma's mother Agnes, her five uncles and maternal grandparents Micko and Aileen. Emma's childhood was filled with music.

In church, on stage with The Donovans, at family and community events and talent shows across New South Wales, Agnes supported her daughter's musical development every step of the way.

"I was pretty spoiled, I was brought up on country music and gospel music."

Donovan has had a long and diverse career since then, and in 2004 released her first solo album Changes. There are moments that stick with her over that time.

"My favorite memories I hold close to are my time with the Black Arm Band. So the bass player and the drummer from The Putbacks were originally in the Black Arm Band which which formed in 2006.

"There was lots of remote and regional touring across the country and overseas but my biggest memories were going to community and the impact us as Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander performers and singers have on our own communities.

"They are the things that I love that made me to want to continue to do more."

The best advice of her career was from Aunty Lou from the band Tidders.

"She would say, as Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists, we have to continue telling our story the way we need to tell it," Donovan said.

Donovan and Port Fairy Folk Festival emerging artist of the year Kee'ahn are working on a new song to be unveiled at the festival in a few weeks' time.

"I feel like she's like a younger version of me, I just love her," Donovan said. "I love watching her, I love that she stands there on her own and just rips it on a bloody guitar. She's amazing.

"As I kind of write more, I want to lean towards my sister girls, my Aboriginal women, stand strong with them and sing alongside them more.

"It's important for me as an older Aboriginal woman, too.

"I'm in my forties and I'm a mum. So even the way that I write and connect now is for my kids. It's changed a lot of the way that I write."

Donovan is the executive producer of Wash My Soul in the River's Flow, an upcoming documentary to be released in cinemas nationally on March 10.

It is a portrait of Archie Roach and Ruby Hunter at the peak of their powers and a moving story of loss, love and what it means to truly come 'home'.

"I think the biggest thing that I always yarn about when I when I think of Uncle Archie and Aunty Ruby is how I've seen them at soundchecks and rehearsals before they take the stage," she said. "They were always at 200 per cent; we've just had these amazing rehearsals and it's like Jesus, are going to get better than this at the gig?

"Times and like that are really precious to me and it's knowledge and inspiration that I don't ever take for granted.

"It's very special for me to witness that."

This year Emma will be focusing on her first solo album in over five years, with sights set on international touring in 2023.

Catch Emma Donovan and The Putbacks at the Port Fairy Folk Festival next month.

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