Didgeri-dazzle

The famous Mills Didjeridu List brought me this video. Sound is a must, as is spending the 3.5 minutes to listen.


(direct link to YouTube video for my RSS friends)

I've got to play more.

Dargin tribute video

The Australian has a good photomontage with audio of Alan Dargin's memorial service in Sydney.

Four minutes.

Alan Dargin is dead

The wikipedia, along with other Australian news services, have the news. The famous Mills list broke the story for me.

This news had me feeling pretty low over the last two days and really quite sad right now. He was one of the first didj players whose name I knew, and his Bloodwood album was first didj CD I ever bought, back in the day of record stores, before the days of MP3.

The man was forty. I've never been to Australia, I never had the pleasure of hearing him in person.

I sat on the porch for a time tonight, cold and beset upon by strong winds- how very appropriate, I felt. I brought out my didjbox and played, in time with the wind, in time with my own heartbeat, playing a little for Cat to listen, more for nobody to hear.

YouTube provides:

Didj images, sounds, and physics

Once again, the stars were in alignment and the didj group met this last Sunday.

We had a really good turnout, with seven people showing (plus kids), not counting the random passers-by and parkgoers asking about our sounds. Robert, Ron, Jessie and Jason, Jon and Alyssa, and myself all made appearances over the course of the afternoon. All told, I'd say we had more than a dozen sticks of varying quality. The first pic at the top (courtesy William Gibson of Wild Imagination Films) of this article is a very very nice aspen stick from Hicks Sticks. I've got to get me one, and I'd really love to play along with this particular instrument, as it is just a hair out of sync with my Rob Thomas black resin didj. There's a marvelous deep pulsing bass beat when the two instruments are played simultaneously.

Jon brought a handful of didjes:














Jon gives my Mindblower a whirl:


















I like the composition of this one, Ron playing Omid's impressively large loaner didj. I don't recall the name of the parkgoer in black.














Another artistic shot, showing Ron's clapsticks.














Jessie's son kept trying to play. That's not a horse in the background, but a Great Dane.




















Some YouTube delight:

This was a great improv jam session between myself and Ron, who is really quite skilled and makes me look good. Most of the sound you'll hear is his louder stalk, as I'm playing more as a backbeat or rhythm.

Direct link to video.

Here's a shorter clip I took of Robert and Ron on the famous forked didj. I wish that I had better sound on this, plus I don't know why YouTube wants to display this landscape and not portrait. Sorry, folks.
Direct link to video.

Why do they sound so good? Ask the physicists.

Forthcoming didj jam

The Austin Didjeridoo Group is going to get together next Sunday, March 18th, at the Bull Creek District Park. Our usual time is from noon until three or four.

Directions:

Get to Highway 360 and the 2222. Drive north on 360, and make a right onto Lakewood, which should be the first light north of 2222. Drive down a twisty, possibly one-lane road and pass a place to park. Keep driving until you cross water- and I don't mean a bridge. On your left you'll see large rocks and a place to park. Park there. Once you park, you'll see the blue picnic tables just inside the park, unless some group beats us to the tables. You'll probably see and hear us!

Anyone is welcome to show up to listen, learn or play.

A second didj jam video

Robert sent me a second didj video and graciously allowed me to post it as well. That's Steve and me playing simultaneously, he on his agave and I on my eucalyptus.

Embedded:


Plain ol' link if the above doesn't work.

Man, there's nothing like jamming with someone, instead of alone or to a CD.

Didj Sunday in the Park

Robert, Steve and I got together this Sunday for a didj jam.

Here's a nice group photo.














From the top:

• Robert's Yucca
• Robert's "Twins"
• My small blue Mindblower
• My baby, the same eucalyptus didj I've had since college
• My new Woolybutt that Cat's cousin brought me from Australia
• My resin Rob Thomas didj bought on craigslist
• Both halves of one agave stalk, handmade by me
• Steve's homemade agave
• Steve's "Barbie Didj," fiberglass over chickenwire
• Steve's Woolybutt
  

Robert














Steve














Want to hear and see me play? Please enjoy this video, courtesy Robert's camera:


If you're on a feed and the embedded video doesn't show, try this direct link to the video. Huzzah, YouTube!

I really need to go back and tag my earlier posts. It's such a pain in Blogger, though.

Discount Didgeridoos

The Didjshop has a holiday special: 25% off select didjes. They also sell gift certificates.

Oh hey, my birthday is in January. :)

I also recently picked up a secondhand didj from a nice lady who didn't play. It's a nice resin/ABS that's been melted and worked some, then painted by Rob Thomas of Inlakesh, so I'm told there's some good pedigree there.





It's a little hard to see in these photos, but the didj is nicely painted with a platypus moving away from its eggs. It has a great loud bouncy sound, and is surprisingly versatile when it comes to vocalizations. YouTube, here I come.

Didj Weekends

This makes three weekends in a row that I've gone out to the park to play didj with a few other guys.

Three weeks ago, nobody showed up. I managed to get my photo taken, though. You can see five of my sticks in this picture: the big agave, my eucalyptus that I've had since college, the long agave, the teak Nepalese, and my (probably cedar) Didjbox all the way in the corner.

Two weeks ago, it was myself, Ben, and Robert. Robert brought his forked didj and Ben had his two PVC didjes. I brought all of the family to show off.

Yesterday, it rained and only Ben showed. I was able to coach Ben into reliably making a decent drone on his long PVC, which made me proud. Maybe I've got a future career as a didj teacher. No barbeque due to the rain, but he and I hung out and jammed for a couple hours. Playing didj in the rain was immensely enjoyable and somehow more primal.

One day, I'll put something up on YouTube so my loyal readers have something to listen to.

Epoxy part two

I have just completed pouring epoxy on the second half of the agave stalk I picked up a few months ago. I shall post pictures later; it needs to cure and I want to see how the final didjeridoo sounds. I'm optimistic.

Myshbackforward: Didj, Game Chef, Movie

Slashdot (News for Nerds. Stuff that Matters.) runs news stories and articles. Occasionally, one will merit a second glance as the story develops; they editorial staff (such as they are) dub this a Slashback. In the same vein, welcome to the Myshbackforward, as I give you a quick update.

Earlier today, I tested out my cut, bored, epoxied — and now waxed agave didj. I originally thought that it played extremely poorly, but with a bit of beeswax as a mouthpiece, I found it much easier to play. Still with very little backpressure, the didj's length and the laws of physics dictate that it's a very low note. I'll try to get a recording accessible to the intarweb.

I just got back from a brainstorming session for this year's Game Chef Competition. It felt really good to get the old noodle working again. To cut to the chase, this year's theme forces a time constraint on the game, and the ingredient menu suggests a Chinese menu- Pick three from Column A (Ancient, Committee, Emotion, Glass) or three from Column B (Actor, Law, Steel, Team). I believe that the time is trickier than it appears at first blush, and successfully working within these constraints may actually be harder than making good thematic use of the ingredients. I'll blog more about this later, but this year's time constraints really force oneself to think about the structure of the game/story.

And speaking of story, tomorrow marks the premiere of Gretchen, a movie my brother worked on. If you already plan to attend SXSW, you might see me there!

Epoxy unleashed!

Resin 'A' plus Hardener 'B' makes waterproof sealant with toxic fumes.

You read that right, True Believers. Today I poured on one of my agave stalks. Lady luck smiled on me this afternoon/evening and I left work on time, plenty of time to get home and get started on this project while I still had some daylight left.

First, I gathered some tools. The full and final list includes: Swiss Army knife, an unsharpened pencil, two large aluminum lasagna trays, yellow disposable rubber gloves, bungee cords, a saw, the measuring tape, Qwikwood brand epoxy wood putty, Bondo Marine Epoxy, an old Austin Chronicle (a free weekly newspaper like the Gambit), and my lovely assistant, Cat. Without her, it's very likely that I'd be epoxied to the agave stalk, the newspaper, the stone floor, the metal railing, and my shoes to all and the same. Huzzah for Cat!

I then examined the stalk for holes. I know that the other half of the stalk has quite a few pencil-sized holes where something got in to chomp on the pith, so I wanted to use the putty to close the larger holes. I luckily found none, though the stalk still had the makings of a split near the top, where I and Steve clamped it down with a pipe clamp.

I next tried to make noise with the bare stalk. To my surprise, I could in fact and in deed get the basic drone out of the unfinished stalk, though I could feel the wood flexing and expanding near the split. The sound was noticeably muted and a but muzzy, likely due to the remaining soft pith inside the stalk. It also had barely any backpressure and I couldn't maintain a drone while circular breathing. I've had the same sort of feeling with certain long PVC practice tubes, so I figured I'd cut off a little at the end and see what happened.

I wound up cutting perhaps three quarters of an inch or so off the bell end and tried playing again. The sound was better; still muzzy and hard to circular breathe on, but definitely a better sound overall. I figured I could pour quickly while I still had light and cut later.

I poured about half of each bottle into my lasagna tray. The stuff smelled like a combination of industrial lubricant and death. Do this outside in a well-ventilated area, kids! Interestingly, the hardener poured faster than the resin. I used the end of a pencil (next time I'll use a chopstick) to stir the stuff. It looked a bit like egg whites at first, but a little more viscous. After a minute or so of beating until fluffy, the mixture was more opaque as well.

Here we go- note my crossed fingers. I poured the epoxy mixture down the stalk a little at a time, maybe a third of a cup or so or a decent dollop down the stalk, rotating slowly as I poured. The other end of the stalk rested in the other lasagna tray, ready to catch the drip and excess. Once the mixture was inside, I kept rotating the stalk to evenly coat the insides. It took around five or ten minutes for a decent amount to collect in the pan at the other end and for epoxy to stop dripping. I reversed the process, pouring down at the bell end and catching the excess in the original pan, rotating continuously. Once that was done, I poured a final time from mouthpiece to bell for good luck. Three's the charm, they say.


Finally, Cat and I bungeed the whole affair to the balcony so it could continue to drip, cure, and dry overnight.

Patience is a virtue, as the lady says.

Exciting times- I look forward to scaring the neighbors tomorrow with low sustained booming noises.

Agave, epoxy, and me

It's still a standstill on the didj making thus far. The weather has yet to cooperate this weekend, being either (or both) too cold and too wet. According to my weather widget, it should be warmer during the week. I can readily pour the epoxy, but I need to work out how to hang the stalks so they can dry overnight. With luck, I won't have to resort to building scaffolding.

If I only had a garage.

Agave didgeridoo work

I had a grand old time Sunday. Yes, that's a power saw. Yes, that's my hand. No, nobody got injured- or involved with the law.

I spent about five hours working with Steve from the Oztin Didjgroup on the agave stalk that I previously recovered. He's got an actual house with a garage and power tools, and he very graciously allowed me to make use of the gear. Not to mention the experience in doing this sort of thing before. We wound up basically just cutting it in half-ish and removing the pith from the center of both stalks. Because the original stalk had laid out for so long, it had nearly dried completely, making for relatively easy going.

Agave smells very much like sugarcane with a hint of something spicy, or maybe cedar or sandalwood.

If you think of an agave stalk as a carrot standing on its thick end, imagine cutting it just south of middle. I wound up with one longer and thinner proto-didj and one shorter and fatter proto-didj. The longer one measures about 82 inches long with a two-and-a-quarter-inch mouthpiece and a three-inch bell, whereas the shorter measures 70 inches long with two-and-three-quarter-inch mouthpiece and a four-and-a-half-inch bell. Roughly, of course- look at my timestamp. Steve thinks that the longer one will sound deeper than the shorter one. Honestly, the physics of the didgeridoo are insane, and I'm not one to question.

Termites or grubs or something had gotten to the end of the stalk, eating out the center. This is how real traditional eucalyptus didgeridoos are made and is extremely unusual for an agave didj to be hollowed out this way, even partially. Once I seal the stalk, I expect the irregular surface will make for some extremely interesting sound.


The next step is for me to obtain the requisite Bondo Marine epoxy resin, wait for warmer weather, and seal these babies. Home Despot alleges they've never heard of the stuff. The quest continues!





Some extra pictures:
The thinner of the two stalks (right) next to the drill (left) used to clean it out. That's four feet of extensions plus a wire brush attachment, incidentally.


Keeping splits in check with some pipe clamps.


Brushes, tools, bits, and bobs. Start with a paddle bit to do most of the grunt work, then move to using the wire brushes to abrade the pith away, leaving the hardwood intact. The walls of the agave are very light and relatively strong- sort of like aluminum of the desert plant world.


This picture shows the LED flashlight bringing the termite grooves into relief. I think this looks really cool. Some of the other shots turned out much blurrier- I'm still working on grokking basic light writing- er, photography.

Today's road trip

Look what I got!

What you see here is me holding a thirteen-foot agave stalk (I'm the one with the saw.). Agave, also known as the "Century plant" or American aloe, is the plant tequila comes from. Strictly speaking, Tequila Agave is a different species from American Agave, but we're dealing with internet botany here, so you lose some of the important details.

I've known for a while that people could make didgeridoos out of agave stalks, but I had always heard that the plant grew in the southeast US in desert-type places like Arizona and New Mexico- places I do not live. I also somehow failed to realize that I live in central Texas now, and therefore live in the desert, and therefore live in a place where agave grows. Steve from the Oztindidjgrp told me that he had made a few dozen didjes from various stalks around the Austin area. I played his and Robert's both- an agave didj has a great power to it and a quick response. I suspect this may be partly due to the thin and porous walls of such an instrument.

I posted on craigslist asking for anyone who knew the location of agave stalks. I got two responses- one fellow told me he spotted one about a half hour away- much closer than the other location and already cut down, though the other person has many stalks on their property, however. I wouldn't mind having a whole slew of stalks to work with, but I don't have a workshop.

I had to get up early (for a Sunday) in order to make the road trip. I've got a regular game on Sundays, so I needed to be to the north edge of the city by one in the afternoon. Cat and I drove out to Bastrop, found the location of the stalk, and I knocked on a total stranger's door and for all intents and purposes asked him if I could haul away his yardwaste. He had no problem with it.

The stalk is really lightweight, much lighter than it looks, and much lighter than my other didj. I'd guess it's about half as dense, but I'm no materials engineer. The stalk obviously had been cut down or fell some months back- the break in the base was not clean and the blooms at the top had withered away and the top had started to rot. Luckily, we brought a saw and readily removed about a yard or so. We also knocked out some of the pith in the center using a stick. For a brief moment, I imagined taking a walkabout and attempting to craft my didj without the aid of modern tools, but then I came to my senses and decided to haul it back to the city and seek aid from those who know.

Of course, that doesn't mean that I'm not going to entertain thoughts of retiring to be a professional didj crafter.

Agave acquired

I now have a stalk! Details and photos later.

Didj day afternoon

Robert and Steve, shown here with their didjes, showed up at the Austin Didj Group get-together this afternoon. Obviously, I was there as well. From left to right, you can see Robert's Y-shaped didj (aka "the Lady"), Steve's agave didj (no known nickname), Robert's agave didj, (aka "the Madman"), and Steve's heavy eucalyptus stick (again, no known nickname). Apologies for the low quality of the picture- I forgot my camera and had to use my now-famous ravetastic phone. My three didjes are out of frame.

Steve made this particular agave didj from a stalk he found around town, and has made several more over the years. So now, all I have to do in order to make one for myself is find someone with a dead agave stalk in their yard. Has anyone out there in Austin-land seen one?

The didjeridoo is a wonderfully unique instrument- almost by definition, no two are exactly alike. Thanks to genetics and the shape of the head, neck, skull, throat, lungs, mouth, and lips, no two players are exactly alike. Every didj player I've ever talked to has always enjoyed hearing someone else play their didj. You may not realize it, but unlike most other instruments, a didj player can't easily listen to their own music. After all, the sound is some four feet away from your ears and moving in the other direction. (This is why my Mindbower didjbox rocks. I can actually hear myself play!) Something about the nature of the drone sound itself prevents it from traveling well or being mic'ed easily. So having another player play your didj is one of the few ways to hear what your instrument sounds like.

This marks the third time I've gotten together with Austin didj players. Each time one of these meets go down, I feel both energized and humbled for pretty much the rest of the day.

News Roundup

I haven't posted in a few days, so please, my loyal readership, accept my apologies. Here's a few things going on in my world.

Salvaging from New Orleans was a little easier this time. I had my apartment to myself, needing to call out for a ride when I got done. It no longer really felt like mine, so perhaps I'm adjusting to apartment complex life. Lakeview was another matter entirely. The whole neutral ground between West End and Pontchartrain is a staging area for garbage. Trees, gutting insides of houses, it's all there and piled three stories deep in places. Again, there's signs at every intersection showing services

My brother found another site that shows what's open in New Orleans and marries it to Google Maps. Check out weshallrise.org.

Saturday, I drove downtown thinking I could salvage an item or two from my office in the Tulane School of Medicine. The CBD, like Lakeview, was eerily empty. It looked like the area took five feet of water, and I realized again what it means for the city to be below sea level. As a child growing up, I never thought much of it. For some reason it really sunk in while standing in the nearly deserted CBD. Both my building and the hospital across the street had huge umbilical tubes for the dehumidifiers into the main entrances. I saw a long line of Port-O-Lets and sanitation stations. I saw a trailer labeled MEDICAL WASTE - BIOHAZZARD. I started to rethink my plan to salvage from my office, but as I was only a few feet away, I decided to keep looking. My normal walking autopilot kicked in and I began to enter via my usual route- but the door was boarded. At the next entrance, I discovered an end-of-E.T.-like plastic barrier a few steps inside. I saw a shadowy figure moving behind it, who moved to unzip the barrier. A worker in full messy gear strolls out- bunny suit, dual-filter breathing apparatus, goggles. I changed my mind very quickly about salvaging without protection.

While I was in the neighborhood, I got a chance to talk with Tim, my boss. I don't know if he realized it, but it was a very Yoda/mentoring/father figure/old man of the mountain moment for me. He definitely helped me get into a forward mental gear.

At the airport, I picked up the Sunday Times-Picayune. The feature article, Where They Died, discussed the dead. I couldn't find the map online, but it was pretty sobering. Imagine a ZIP code by ZIP code breakdown for Orleans parish and individual dots for individual bodies found in Jefferson.

I made it safe and sound back into Austin. Interestingly, my cab driver back from the airport was a laid-off city planner, so he knew the city extremely well. Perhaps I just have bad luck with cab drivers, but it seems that more often than not, we get a cabbie who's out of his zone or new to the job.

Almost instantly after getting home, I needed to run back out again. Austin has a sizable population of didgeridoo players, and Sunday afternoon marked a get-together and jam session. It's the first time I've been around more than one skilled player. I had a great time playing and talking to others. We swapped a few sticks and I got to play an agave didj for the first time. Incredibly light and with a full, loud, sound, I definitely was impressed. I may actually look into picking one up for keepsies. I did manage to pick up some beeswax, so I'll be able to fix the mouthpiece. I'm extremely stoked to be playing again. With luck, this will be a weekly happening.

I'm also trying to get my collective act together by using the Getting Things Done methodologies. More on this later.