Every musician has a story of how they came to their instrument or how their instrument came to them. My own history with the didgeridoo has been a short but very eventful one. The story goes somewhat like this....
In 1999, I found my way to this unusual wooden instrument while I was in an interview to become a roommate. One of the women who was interviewing me, retrieved a didgeridoo from the house and started playing it. I was intrigued. She taught me the drone and I got it. However, I didn't think much about it after that until Spring of 2005 when I heard David Hudson's album Rainbow Serpent. It blew my mind and I had to learn how to play this instrument. I had just gotten a bamboo didge that was much like playing a telephone pole but that didn't stop me from trying to do what I heard on the album.
Over the next two years, I practiced day and night, in my car, in grocery stores, my kitchen, anywhere I had a spare moment in addition to just sitting down and practicing. I had no clue as to where all of this would lead but I was (and still am) willing to be open.
About a year into all of this practicing, I began busking and ended up putting out my first album, a little EP called Didgeridoo Sampler. While it may not be the best didgeridoo album in the world, it did turn out to be a humble beginning to many, many other things. Those many other things include performances, workshops, private lessons, presentations, collaborations, making didgeridoos and meeting lots and lots of extraordinary people.
Early 2008 saw me making some of the first didgeridoo from yucca. It seemed like a natural next step so one snowy March morning, I headed to Olympia (a town south of where I live) and made my first didgeridoo through a didgeridoo making session with a local maker.
I had a great time so I kept making them. It's been a tremendous learning process and a joy to craft a raw stick into a musical instrument and it never ceases to amaze me that some instruments I've made now have homes in the US, Canada and even China.
So, what started out as an experiment has now grown to a full blown passion. Just what is it about this instrument that makes me so devoted to it? Well, it's a way I can synthesize sound satisfying the acoustical nut in me, it's an instrument that has opened my senses to all kinds of possibilities but most of all it has become an instrument that I can speak with. It gives me a way to express and communicate from the inside in a way I can't with other instruments I play. And as far as building is concerned, well, I'll just say there is a medative quality and creativity to working with wood. It's the process of working and watching the ugly ducking turn into that proverbial swan. It's a beautiful process
As for my history with music? It's been long and varied. I've played music since I was six beginning with the organ and later piano. I've sung in choirs, performed with both organ and piano and have written a number of pieces for various ensembles ranging from a single instrument to full-on orchestral works. I spent four incredible years at Cornish College of the Arts in Seattle graduating with a bachelor's degree in composition and have been honored with awards including Seattle Arts Commission's Seattle Artist Award, Yamaha Composition Award and more recently, voted Best Performer at Flute Quest in September 2008. All of this has, in turn, led me to teaching piano, voice and didgeridoo at Moore Brothers Music in Sammamish, Washington for the past five years and the release of three albums-Mosaic, Didgeridoo Sampler and more recently, Treespeak.
The didgeridoo is taking me places within and without that I had only dreamed of before. It's been an amazing journey so far and I'm looking forward to seeing where this road goes.....one beat at a time.....
Thanks for stopping by and taking a moment to learn more about what I do. I hope we will meet sometime soon. Until then, take care.
Many thanks and peace,
Pam
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