A long, deep, vibrating growl is followed by a gruff boom. A throttled scream is quickly replaced by explosive barks. High squeaks seem to mix with strange and muffled voices. And all the time there is the long, deep growl .. .

Listening to these sounds, you can imagine a magical conversation between animals, plants, wind, sky and the depths of the Earth. The music is hundreds of years old and you would hear it in Australia. The sounds are made on a didgeridoo. Say the word slowly, didg-eri-doo. The word sounds like the music. The didgeridoo is played by the Aboriginal people on special occasions, to accompany dancing.

A special instrument

Everything about the didgeridoo is fascinating. A didgeridoo can be several metres long. And it is made like no other instrument. First a branch is chopped from a eucalyptus tree and may be buried in a termite hill. The termites eat the soft wood inside the branch, leaving a hollow cylinder. This is taken out, cleaned, and sometimes decorated with patterns. The patterns usually take the form of dreamlike animals, whose lives are described in Aboriginal myths. Didgeridoo music often expresses the voices of these mythical animals.

Blowing a continuous note

Didgeridoo music is a series of almost continuous notes. It seems as if there is no time for the musicians to breathe. So how do they manage? The Aboriginal player has developed a technique of continuous breathing. It takes an incredible amount of skill and practice. Take a deep breath through your nose. Breathe out steadily through your mouth. Just before you run out of breath, puff out your cheeks. And then — this is the difficult part — squeeze the air out of your cheeks and take a quick, deep breath through your nose at the same time. It seems impossible, but there is no magic to it — just technique and practice. But you don’t just blow into the didgeridoo. It’s really a kind of trumpet. You have to start the air vibrating inside by pursing your lips together as you blow.

Make your own didgeridoo

Make an instrument like a didgeridoo from a long cardboard tube, or a section of plastic tube used for drainpipes. Your tube needs to be about 1.5 metres long. Decorate the tube with bright patterns and start practising your continuous breathing! Once you can make the basic booming note, start experimenting. Make other sounds in the tube, like clicking, shouting, buzzing, croaking and humming. You probably won’t master the skill of continuous breathing, but you will hopefully make some good sounds.

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dodoMusic, Trumpet23 Nov, 2008