In the first year of his PhD, Anthony Albrecht didn't expect to be producing an album that would beat global superstar Taylor Swift on the Australian Record Industry Association (ARIA) charts.
But the album, 'Australian Bird Calls | Songs of Disappearance' – which features a track of chirps from the critically endangered Swift Parrot – formed a crucial part of Dr Albrecht's research and is a highlight he reflects on as he prepares to graduate from Charles Darwin University (CDU) this week.
Dr Albrecht is graduating with a PhD in Conservation Biology and is one of 12 PhD candidates tipping their caps to CDU in May.
Dr Albrecht is an internationally renowned cellist and producer who graduated with a Master of Music from The Julliard School in New York.
He co-founded arts conservation organisation the Bowerbird Collective with acclaimed violinist and partner Dr Simone Slattery.
The pair, while performing in remote Cape York in 2020, shared their passion for using music to tell stories about nature with CDU's Professor Stephen Garnett, who became Dr Albrecht's supervisor.
Dr Albrecht's PhD focuses on the impacts of environmental art on attitudes and behaviours. The Bowerbird Collective's catalogue of performances and projects were turned into case studies, laying the groundwork for Dr Albrecht's research and future academia.
"While the methods we used were in their infancy and very experimental, the studies showed very promising results for a net-positive impact of these concerts and albums in encouraging pro-environmental attitudes and behaviours," Dr Albrecht said.
His research has led him to work with leaders of international conservation organisations on using art in conservation messaging, and to produce two ARIA chart-topping albums highlighting threatened species.
'Songs of Disappearance', showcased the sounds of threatened bird species collected by nature recordist David Stewart, and was released alongside BirdLife Australia's 2020 Action Plan for Australian Birds.
"We did what we set out to do, which was to share this message of Australia's threatened birds via a creative project, but we achieved so much more than that," Dr Albrecht said.
"The project raised more than $80,000 for Birdlife Australia, put the Bowerbird Collective on the map globally, and suddenly we had more than 8,000 album customers available to complete digital surveys. We created a new audience, and we suddenly had a really interesting research project in our hands.
"Within the first year of my enrolment at CDU, we were beating Taylor Swift on the ARIA charts with Swift Parrots and other species."
A year later the bird album was followed by a frog version of Songs of Disappearance, released in partnership with the Australian Museum's FrogID project.
This second album featuring the calls Australia's most threatened frogs, including several that are now extinct, and debuted at No.3 on the ARIA Top 50 album charts ahead of Michael Buble, Ed Sheeran, ABBA and Adele.
While Dr Albrecht - who completed his PhD remotely - is in Darwin to end this journey with CDU, he's also returning for one of the Bowerbird Collective's latest productions: Earth Emotions | Music & philosophy for nature.
Earth Emotions is a collaboration with Dr Albrecht's father, environmental philosopher Professor Glenn Albrecht.
"This concert is a translation of Glenn's life work into a journey of extraordinary music and spoken word. Simone and I play a selection of deeply moving repertoire paired with Glenn's vitally important ideas for our shared future, which he narrates on stage with us" Dr Albrecht said.
"It's extremely special to be on stage with an eminent environmental philosopher, let alone my dad, and to be able to travel with him and my family for this concert."
Earth Emotions will be held at CDU Theatre in Casuarina on May 14 from 7.30pm.
