Dark side of pro didgeridoo playing

Relatively recently I have written an article “How to turn professional in didgeridoo playing” and now I would like to say why you shouldn’t. 😉 I believe it is again a universal kind of aspect to all small scale worlds within big world. So what are the difficult aspects of pro didgeridoo world?

1. Money.

I would like to sort out the big topic first. Simply put, as you can imagine, there is not a lot of money in didgeridoo world. If you wish for a lot of money, I recommend you search for it elsewhere. Didgeridoo festivals are small and relatively poor. Or they hide their money, I don’t know. But they can’t pay a lot. Venues usually don’t pay a lot for didgeridoo playing as didgeridoo players don’t bring big audience. Playing on street… is from my experience usually not the way to make a lot of money. And conditions to all of these aspects are sometimes harsh. In all these aspects, you cannot blame anybody. It is just the way things are at the moment. This is the current commercial position of didgeridoo in the world. Of course, it is one of the aspects, but since I talk about dark sides, I don’t want to make a counterbalance. And of course, this aspect is not one fixed aspect of the world, it can change any moment, unpredictably. But since I speak about dark side, I won’t mention that either.

2. Relationship & balance between: You-Money-Playing-Doing something else-Joy

This is the old mind trick that starts when we are kids. First tidy up your room and then you can play. There is reward for work and there is no reward for playing. So it implies that either your didgeridoo playing has to become some kind of work and that you can get money for it. Or that because of the fact that we need to get money from it, it will transform to work. Anyway, it is not the same to keep the level of joy and playfulness once things become “serious” because of money. Some, I believe, would find loss of will to play.

3. Investment of time and energy

To become “really good” and make something “new” with your playing I would say you need to invest around 5 hours a day for around 5 years. Every day. Only very small breaks. None of these hours will be payed with money. Later, you will be able to do your job and get money for that, but in the learning process, it is payed in another way. Skill, knowledge, experience. Very good, but you can’t eat those.

4. No association – no support

You stand alone as didgeridoo player. There is absolutely no institution behind you. If you apply to any venue/festival/place, you come as one tiny human being. There is no background. The lack of global association makes it difficult to connect your tours, to make some logical line ofappearances at the festivals, to have a network of venues and workshop places… You are on your own.

5. Small community – small support

However, you do have something, I do need to mention community. And they will probably give you some support because majority of community is simply cool or even very cool;-) But again, people with understanding for didgeridoo are usually not powerful influential people with good positions. I mean, they are powerful, but more in the cosmic way that did not yet manifest to this world. All in all, they will do their best to help you and they will, but be sure that you will also have to be there with them and help them out in any way you can. Unless you are a bastard and you will lose your community then. So imagine very basic, natural human relationship and no stars in the sky of didgeridoo music. Ups sorry, this is almost a light side…

6. Difficult to get to outer world

Regarding everything I said it is easy to connect the dots and realize that as a didgeridoo player everybody will look at you differently from the “outside world”. Even if you are a “star” in the didgeridoo world. This means if you apply to world music festival you will most probably never get any kind of answer. Other festivals have a deal with mail providers and postal services not to even receive anything sent from you. You will have a label of “wiouwauoiwiou” all over the music world and most people in UK will think you try to play like Rolf Harris. There exist some cracks, but you need utter ninja skills to pass through them. Some players did. But none that I know did it easily.

7. Angry didgeridoo people

Sometimes your brothers and sisters, but especially brothers, will not be very cool towards you. Sooner or later it is probable you will receive angry long letters or brutal comments. More as you become good and separate from the crowd. It will be easy to realize that the didgeridoo world or any other small scale underworld of beautiful core is not a direct manifestation of heaven. There are many demons roaming around boosting your growth. Demonic or angelic- depends on you.

So what’s the point of this article?

He hee… this is the fun part. Basically the point was to write an article for all the didgeridoo players, all enthusiasts or small scale world artists who think that becoming a pro is something (only) great. I feel the great thing is to establish balance in life. Inner balance. Outer balance is already right here where we are. A direct consequence of the inner one. You don’t need to calculate it, you can just observe it. There are no excuses. Cosmos doesn’t care about excuses to change the outer balance. Only inner one changes it. Maybe with some delay, but that’s it. Inner balance also changes and moves. You can choose to follow it or to diminish it. I feel to follow it is not so much of a doing, but allowing it to happen. The feeling of love is present. To diminish it is to go away from it. In fear. Often hidden. Or in a desire. Often super seductive thought generator. But how will you know if it is a wave of inner balance or a desire that will disperse with the coming of new desire? How can you know what your inner balance wants to “do”?

Do you want to do it regardless of anything?

That is your answer.

Du

PS. This is an inspiring movie that presents the life of a small scale artist/artisan/craftswoman in a very nice way… I highly recommend!!!

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