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| 10/03/2007: "Last-Minute Entry"
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All right, I'd promised to come up with 1,000 words by midnight tonight. Wow, it's been quite a while since any lengthy entries have appeared here... let's see, what should we talk about?
Hmmm, don't know if I can do it right now; it's getting late and energy is flagging. Would it be OK if I pasted in an old entry -- a really old one, just for now -- and tried again tomorrow? I'll delete the older entry when new material appears, promise. So, let's see:
Didgeridoos have a reputation as being very difficult to play. In reality, it's not particularly hard to 'doo, and is certainly easier to learn than most other wind instruments. The concept of circular breathing, so central to didge playing, has a rather mystical, elusive aura. However, I've seen people learn to circular breathe, and be sounding quite impressive on a didge in less than a week! After all, there's only so much one can do on the instrument -- that is, speaking as one who has an extensive musical background, and plenty of other avenues for musical expression. For these reasons -- the lessening of the novelty factor, the saturation of the field by so many other enthusiasts, and the plentitude of other musical challenges -- my didge activity has been scaled back. For more information (and, I daresay, much sheer nonsense) about didgeridoos, you can peruse about 1,000,000 websites these days. You're on your own there; just be sure to check alternate spellings of the word while doing searches for sites, and don't believe everything you read! Of course, there's plenty of good stuff, too.
Just as the difficulty of didge playing is often overestimated, it's also no big deal to make a simple didgeridoo. One can go to any hardware store, buy a few feet of appropriately sized plumbing pipe, stick on a mouthpiece of kneaded wax or other material, and produce a decent-sounding instrument, just fine for a beginner, in five minutes! Today hundreds -- thousands -- of people worldwide are making didges, from a wide variety of tubular materials, both natural and synthetic. My own didges are made of bamboo -- surprised? The most famous type of authentic Aboriginal didges are made of termite-hollowed logs! However, in the moister regions of Australia where bamboo can be found, this material was also utilized. As a matter of fact, in some Aborigine dialects the word for "didgeridoo" is the same word as that for "bamboo!"
Please note that the Aborigines, who originated the didgeridoo, have a strong, living musical/mystical tradition built on the instrument. Authentic Aboriginal instruments are in a separate class, and the many variations on the theme which are currently being made around the world are less artistically legitimate, in the view of traditionalists. Incidentally, the very name "didgeridoo" isn't an Aborigine word -- it's an onomatopoeic Anglicization! (Sorry; couldn't resist.) There are a number of distinct regional/tribal dialects spoken by Aborigines, and each dialect has its own indigenous name for the instrument; yidaki is one alternate name that's fairly well-known, and some didge players, even outside of Australia, prefer to use this term, regarding it as more authentic.
While one must respect the customs and beliefs of the Aborigines regarding this instrument (which they developed, after all), such beliefs remain deeply conservative and impose many restrictions. For instance, according to tradition women are never allowed to play, or even to touch, the instrument. Some Aborigines resent the broad global dissemination of the didge, and its resultant culturally-promiscuous use. For example, a few years ago the pop star Madonna paid a visit Down Under, and was given a didgeridoo as a gift, by a non-Aborigine fan. There was considerable press coverage of the resulting fuss: a number of Aborigine leaders publicly denounced this sacreligious act of giving the instrument to a woman! (And Madonna, no less...)
...Well, at least we got to see didgeridoos in the news...
Fact is, such a furor merely illustrates the sort of rigid cultural traditionalism to which I personally am allergic, in any ethnic context. Sometimes tradition can be the enemy of art, especially of innovation and inventiveness in artistic endeavors -- but I won't linger on that well-worn soapbox right now. After all, any people as historically abused and repressed -- well, let's just say systematically exterminated, as the Aborigines were by Europeans -- are bound to develop reactionary attitudes about perceived breaches of their surviving cultural traditions. We can't blame them for that, and if I were in the Outback among a group of Aborigines, I'd scrupulously respect their views on such matters. However: in the world at large, all bets are off, and all musical instruments belong to humanity as a whole. Music ain't called the Universal Language for nothin'...
The didgeridoo actually represents the oldest, most "primitive" form of the trumpet family -- which in the broad sense, refers to any tubular wind instrument whose sound is produced by a buzzing of the lips, in "raspberry" fashion. As a matter of fact, it's a frequently-overlooked fact that didgeridoo-type instruments have appeared all over the world, at various times in history. In many ethno/geographical zones, the continuing evolution of the trumpet-concept has proceeded so far as to obscure the memory of its earlier, more didgeridoo-like manifestations. However, even in a place like Europe there are still examples of historical instruments that resemble didges much more than they resemble modern trumpet-family instruments.
There are other, still-surviving traditions of simple trumpet instruments closely resembling didges. A number of native Amazonian tribes play tubes -- generally of bamboo -- which closely mirror didgeridoos in structure and technique. And the Pygmies of Africa play an instrument called the molimo, which is essentially a didge; in Colin Turnbull's fascinating account of life with the pygmies, it's described in some detail. Interestingly enough, according to Turnbull's account the Pygmies have the same (as the Australian Aborigines') strict prohibition against women coming into any contact with the instrument -- or, in the Pygmies' case, even openly acknowledging that it actually exists! (The sound of the molimo is attributed to the voice of a mythical beast, as far as the womens' belief-role is concerned.) Hmmmmm...Freud would have a field day there! The music of the molimo is evocatively described in Turnbull's wonderful book The Forest People: a Study of the Pygmies of the Congo. Check it out!
A bit of research would reveal numerous other examples of didge-like instruments. But having said all this, it does seem that the Aborigines have gone farther than any other ethnic group in developing a sophisticated playing technique on these simple trumpets. I suspect that this phenomenon is related to the relative stasis of Aborigine technological development over a long time period; the instrument has remained in its Stone Age form for millenia, which gave ample time to fully develop its mythology, as well as the playing techniques...which brings us to another book recommendation:
Guns, Germs and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies, by Jared Diamond
"Winner of the Pulitzer Prize and a national bestseller: the global account of the rise of civilization that is also a stunning refutation of ideas of human development based on race."
--I'm currently immersed in my third reading of this book, which is absolutely amazing. Check it out, too!
See y'all later,
RB
[Previous entry: "1,000 words coming tomorrow..."]
[Next entry: "Still more apologies"]
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