Salil Blog

PRESS RELEASE 24 April, 2024
Multidisciplinary artist and musician Salil Subedi is doing a solo didgeridoo sound journey recital “Didgeridoo Sound Experience” on Friday 3rd May 2024, from 6:30 to 8:30 PM at the Patan Museum Courtyard in Lalitpur.

Didgeridoo is an ancient wind instrument made from the eucalyptus tree branch hollowed out by the termites. It is an important part of the aboriginal people of Australia who migrated to the continent around 50,000 years ago. And the didgeridoo has been present in some of the aboriginal groups since ancient times – some say as long ago as, 2000 years.

The Nepali artist Salil started playing didgeridoo in the late 1990s upon stumbling into ‘Sirocco’ the Australian-Irish band while he was still working as an active correspondent in the national print media, the Kathmandu Post, Himal fortnightly and the Nepali Times. Later in 2002, he left media career and began playing the didgeridoo as a professional artist. He first made spiritual journeys with didgeridoo between mount Kailash in the Tibetan plateau to the floodplains of Ganges in Varanasi.

Some of his early performances include playing for the frogs and the rain deities at the Bagmati river conservation campaign, the young monks at Sechen monastery in Boudha and the Nude Art performance at Nagarjuna forest during Sutra nature art camp. Then he continued playing with nature themes and dreamtime and went on to perform in the wild forests and national parks in Nepal and India, while blending his didgeridoo music with his diverse expertise in nature and wildlife conservation dramas and contemporary performance art practices, including making music workshops and playing for village audience from far-west Nepal to the east during his term as a team leader of Doko Radio, a pioneering community FM radio unit. Now, he is an internationally recognised artist and the Nepali didgeridoo player to have performed three full solos sets in different years in the Swizzeridoo the Swiss didgeridoo festival.

In this ‘sound experience’ event Salil wants to invite a small number of audience to actively listen for something very simple but which is very challenging in a world filled with noise and distractions. The deep resonant overtones he plays on didgeridoo and other instruments have the potential to transport listeners to a place of inner reflection and serenity. “In fact it’s too limiting to define what this music of the earth coming out with a blend of didgeridoo, traditionally called the Yidaki, can do and how each one will perceive and process the sound and the experience. It’s a discovery for me and my audience every time we come together in a recital like this,” he says.

He says the ancient courtyard of the Patan Museum fits very well to this idea. “The venue of Patan museum and its courtyard that was once restored by very important architects of our times, hold a magic of a peaceful environment where one can close their eyes, listen to the sounds and go on a deep inner journey away from everyday stress. To perform here under the trees and plants in the springtime is a great opportunity for me to pay respect to nature, to the aboriginal elders of Australian dreamtime whom I’ve never met, to the ancient artisans of Lalitpur and those who continue to preserve this magical space.”

For this event, Patan Museum is collaborating as an event venue partner while the newly launching Patan Museum Cafe run by the Hotel Himalaya is the hospitality partner. And the entire event is a collaboration between the artist and the U-Turn events.

Artist blog: http://www.salil.blog
Event Director: Robin Sitoula
9851056957
robin@uturngroup.com
(For Press Contact / Event)

Ticket Information:
Pranab, 9862790677
Tickets are available at: Boudha (Taragaon Next) . Jamal (Mandala Book Point) . Nagpokhari (cafe IMAGO), Thamel (Himalayan Java above Northface) . Patan (Shade collection, Swotha Square)