Hudson, David

Artist: David Hudson
P: 1998  
A member of the Tjapukai tribe in northern Queensland, Australia, didgeridoo player David Hudson has once again teamed with producer and ambient artist Steve Roach to create his fourth album, Gunyal. The title refers to a giant, prehistoric reptile whose mythic story has passed orally through aboriginal generations. Known to Australian aborigines as goannas, these reptiles existed some 20,000 years ago, according to archaeologists, and it's this kind of transcendent connection to an ancient past that spills through on Gunyal. Listeners will find their imagination swept into the Australian outback as soon as they push the "play" button. Sounds of the deep, rolling didgeridoo drone over rhythms created by click sticks, boomerang clap sticks, and rocks. While Rainbow Serpent and Woolunda: Ten Solos for Didgeridoo were more stark representations of the didgeridoo, Gunyal travels more profoundly into the aboriginal soul with Roach's ethereal crescendos and atmosphere. While plenty of CDs thickly embellish the didg with electronics or modern grooves, Gunyal relies on the simplicity of tradition and the subtle trimmings of ambient sound.

Artist: David Hudson
P: 1994 
Rainbow Serpent is one of the most important recordings of Australian Aboriginal music ever made. David Hudson, master of the Aboriginal instrument known as the didgeridoo, combines with long-time collaborator and producer, Steve Roach, to create music from a 50,000 year tradition which maintains its heart and soul in the setting of a modern digital recording studio.
Traditionally, the didgeridoo is capable of only one note, although numerous overtones of that note can be brought out and a wide variety of blowing techniques can sharply change the sound. In Rainbow Serpent, Hudson uses multiple didgeridoos, with simple percussion and some of Steve Roach's subtle digital processing, to create a unique recording that blends the most ancient musical sounds with the latest hi-tech sound devices.
Rainbow Serpent is clearly rooted in the Aboriginal tradition. Hudson uses the traditional technique of circular breathing to keep the flow of music continuous and to maintain its meditative state. In this technique, the player forces air out of his mouth while breathing in through the nose. The sound is punctuated by a repertoire of traditional grunts and cries, representing different animal spirits. This album is also the work of a contemporary musician and composer. Hudson uses original calls and vocalizing techniques to striking effect on Laura's Festival. Eerie, deep spatial effects are created by the combination of didgeridoo and digital reverb on Undara's Lava Tube; and in Leprechaun Corroboree, Hudson uses Celtic sounding percussion patterns as accompaniment.
Hudson's concluding piece is a spacey tour-de-force called New Beginning. Ringing harmonics, sweeping arcs of didgeridoos, and lonely bush sounds from Queensland, Australia, all inhabit the vast inner space of Steve Roach's digital studio environment. Rainbow Serpent is not a relic of ancient history, but a new Aboriginal music for the late 20th Century.

Artist: David Hudson
P: 1997
Produced by longtime collaborator and producer Steve Roach, The Art of the Didjeridu: Selected Pieces 1987-1997 is a collection of timeless pieces spanning a decade in David Hudson's professional career. It features deeply rooted and rich Aboriginal traditions as well as innovative contemporary styles and compositions. The priceless contribution Hudson has made to the art of the didjeridu is the infinite musically creative possibilities of a traditionally one note ancient instrument.
With the unprecedented interest in Australian Aboriginal culture and art, the ancient Northern Australian wind instrument - the didjeridu - has experienced an astonishing popularity and ever growing interest in the West. Whether it's the sought-after sounds and rhythms akin to nature or the varied interest in Aboriginal culture, the didjeridu speaks with an unforgettable primordial voice to all who hear it. With the vast array of intricate rhythms and otherworldly tone colors, the elaborate improvisations that result strike a deeply buried chord in the mysteries of creation which seems to resonate at the core of humankind.
Selected pieces from the years 1987 - 1997. Produced by Steve Roach.

Artist: David Hudson
P: 1993 
Woolunda is the first solo album by didgeridoo virtuoso, David Hudson. Although he makes his own instruments and performs in traditional styles, this artist has also taken the art form to a new level through an innovative combination of extended techniques and modern compositional ideas.
Air Cave for instance, was the result of an immediate response to the sonorous atmosphere created by a Lexicon digital reverb. Hudson's inventive use of voice, space and explosive blasts of sound have more in common with 20th century avant-garde music than ancestral Aboriginal music. Woolunda features another expansion of didgeridoo technique. By fitting together two PVC pipes, one inside the other, Hudson is able to modulate the pitch much like a trombone slide. Didgerijig is an engaging combination of sounds from the Australian outback set to joyful Celtic rhythms. Roo and My People, on the other hand, are rooted in Hudson's years of traditional playing.
Recorded in a single evening, David Hudson's spontaneous, multi-leveled compositions were performed live with no overdubs or post-production enhancements. Producer, Steve Roach, provided a carefully designed resonant setting that inspired Hudson to play with ambience and to take the didgeridoo in some unexpected directions. On Woolunda, Hudson illustrates that the didgeridoo is truly a timeless instrument, able to sustain the ancestral sounds as it expresses the continued evolution of the Aboriginal experience.

Producer, Recorded By, Mixed By – Steve Roach

Artist: Steve Roach & D.Hudson & S.Hopkins
P: 1990    
Australia: Sounds of the Earth captures the primordial hums and rhythms that have emerged from and moved across this continent in the four directions, like the winds themselves since The Dreamtime began. This recording features the didgeridoo, an Aboriginal wind instrument of remarkable flexibility and power, in traditional and innovative formats. Virtuoso solos by Aboriginal artist, David Hudson, are complemented by performances of up to four didgeridoo players accompanied by drums and electronics.Tracing the development of an indigenous music firmly rooted in patterns of existence dictated by the rhythms of the land, Australia: Sounds of the Earth embraces Australia's musical past and present. The riveting performance of cellist Sarah Hopkins, acknowledges the debt 20th century composers owe to the influence of Aboriginal music. By utilizing a combination of bowing techniques and overtone singing, the Australian cellist emulates sounds of the didgeridoo. Producer, Steve Roach, blends the recordings from the outback with their haunting modern echoes by creating evocative soundscapes, and the illusion of a journey through time and space to the origins of these primal sounds.