Hand to Earth

In Hand to Earth, Yolŋu song keepers Daniel and David Wilfred recontextualise their 40,000 year old song tradition in a resolutely contemporary setting with Korean born vocalist, Sunny Kim, trumpet and electronics maestro, Peter Knight, and woodwind virtuoso Aviva Endean.

Hand to Earth, has quickly developed an international reputation as one of Australia’s most distinctive contemporary music ensembles winning international praise and a slew of awards. The quintet’s third album, produced by ROOM40 boss Lawrence English, and Peter Knight, is about to be released accompanied by a UK Europe tour which sees the band collaborate with British superstar, SHABAKA, for performances including the Barbican Centre London, Pierre Boulez Saal Berlin, and De Singel Antwerp with Sami singer/composer, Ánnámáret. This tour will celebrate their new ROOM40 release, Ŋurru Wäŋa.

From Peter Knight -

Ŋurru Wäŋa traces notions of home, belonging, and displacement. In the two parts of the title track, Sunny Kim intones the words of Korean poet Yoon Dong Ju’s poem, Another Home, in counterpoint to Daniel Wilfred’s song, sung in the Wäglilak language. Ŋurru Wäŋa (pronounced Wooroo Wanga), translates as ‘the scent of home’, and as we travel we long for that fragrance, passing the bee, guku, making the bush honey while the crow circles calling overhead.

This theme - this search for a sense of belonging - is at the heart of what drives Hand to Earth, a group of five people, who come together from different backgrounds, different birthplaces, and different musical approaches to share our songs, and by doing that to create something new. The six tracks on this album map our respective journeys into the now and express the connections that have developed within Hand to Earth over the years we have travelled and played together. We each have our own relationship to this place, its difficult history, its contended present, its clouded future. This music is perhaps a way of thinking through this, written in the scribble of electronics, in the sighs of the clarinet and trumpet, in the broad brush strokes of the yidaki, and the snap of the bilma.

The songs that sit at the heart of Ŋurru Wäŋa were recorded mid-tour on a day off in Melbourne. Daniel had a spontaneous urge to record songs from the song line of Djuwaḻpada who is an important figure in Wägilak dreaming. Djuwaḻpada walked through the land starting in Daniel’s country, Nyilipidgi, in central Arnhem Land and ending at the coast at Lutenbuy singing the place and everything that lives there into existence. Daniel’s song cycle traces the flight of the birds, the Mäḏawk and Wäk Wäk. It describes the seasons, and the Stringybark tree, Gaḏayka, that supplies the bark for painting, and the wood for the bilma (clapping sticks).

With the exception of The Crow, which was recorded in New York, these songs landed in single takes in one session recording just the voice, bilma, and yidaki with some synth drones and other materials. The rest of the sounds came later in separate iterative recording sessions, in which the settings for the songs were developed through spontaneous layering and rubbing back. This process reflected the approach we take to live performance but stretched across time, our voices calling to one another. Creating connections - resonating, blurring, vibrating.

“While many contemporary projects strive to combine ancient and modern influences, this innovative and ethereal musical alliance actually achieves that lofty goal – with old cultural ground being respected, while new artistic ground is broken. Hand to Earth is a truly exquisite album. “

* * * * * Songlines UK

New album Ŋurru Wäŋa now on ROOM40

MOKUY on ROOM40 (2023)

Debut self titled album on AAO Recordings (2022)