Tony Gray shares his passion for empowering remote communities through music. We talk about his training as an improvising musician and how that built the resilience to solve the unique challenges of creating employment and enterprise in his isolated community. In his own words, he holds a "degree in making things up" which sounds like perfect training for life as an entrepreneur.
Tony Gray lives and works in remote Numbulwar, where he is Managing Director and Pilot at AiRemote. Tony designs and delivers development programs in Arnhem Land and Indonesia. Prior to his life as a social entrepreneur, Tony was a professional musician in Melbourne and holds a Bachelor of Music (Improvisation) on Double Bass from the VCA.
QUOTES
This relates back to music as well, you have to do anything you can to keep you going so you can focus on the one thing and that’s developing jobs and employment opportunities in remote communities.”
“I’ve got a degree in improvisation. I’ve got a degree in making things up. In the end, that’s basically life in business. You just make stuff up all the time so you can get enough revenue to keep going.”
“It was just an impossible mission, but I took it on and went non-stop sleeping in my car along the way and travelling at night and really early mornings just to get it done.”
LINKS
PODCAST TEAM
Production Penny Manwaring
Audio Engineering from Frazer Ruddick
Theme Music Composed by Danna Yun
Theme Music Composed by Natasha Pearson
Theme Music Performed by Alison McIntosh-Deszcz (soprano), Natasha Lin (piano), and Susan Eldridge (horn).
Theme Music Recorded Lady Marigold Southey Performance Studio, 3MBS Fine Music in Melbourne in October 2016. With thanks to recording engineer Cheryl Scott.
FIRST BROADCAST
30 November 2016