★★★★★
The deeply emotional sound of the duduk, an Armenian wind instrument, evokes distant centuries and distant lands
In 2017, Steven Wilson told Discogs that Tangerine Dream’s 1972 album Zeit is,
‘The original and greatest ambient record, years before the notion of ambient music existed. It’s music without melody, rhythm or structure, but listening to it is like filling the room with the most beautiful and mysterious perfume.’
50 years after the release of Zeit, Wilson worked as a producer and created soundscapes on another ambient album that fills the room with metaphorical perfume. Theo Travis’s ‘one hour duduk meditation’ is called Aeolus, the name in Greek mythology of the divine ruler of the winds. In Homer’s Odyssey, Aeolus gives Odysseus a leather bag containing all the winds, except for the temperate West Wind, which will blow his ship’s crew to their destination. The West Wind is regarded as the mildest and gentlest of the Four Winds, and the name of the album is another apt metaphor for ambient music.
Travis, flute and saxophone player with Soft Machine, and a collaborator on some of Wilson’s solo albums, recorded a one-hour ambient track of improvisations on the duduk, an ancient Armenian woodwind instrument. He posted it on YouTube, and to his surprise, it attracted over one million views without any publicity, from a range of music fans and those who wanted to use it for meditation or relaxation.
Inspired by its success, Travis produced a new duduk improvisation called Aeolus. Wilson provided soundscapes assembled from Travis’ alto flute playing. The completed album is now available on Wilson’s new online store, Headphone Dust, in high-resolution stereo, 5.1 surround sound and Dolby Atmos. It’s also available in a combined CD/Blu-ray double pack. The original meditation, called Ancient Souls, Modern Times, is included on the Blu-ray in a remastered version; it has now had over two million views on YouTube.
The Duduk
The duduk is an Armenian wind instrument, traditionally made of apricot wood. It has a double reed, like various orchestral wind instruments such as the bassoon, oboe, and cor anglais (English horn). It has been described as ‘the saddest sounding instrument in the world.’ Its melancholy, otherworldly and ancient-sounding tone is popular with film music composers such as Hans Zimmer. Travis plays the instrument on Beautiful Scarecrow from Steven Wilson’s 2023 solo album, The Harmony Codex, and on Daevid’s Special Cuppa from the latest Soft Machine album, Thirteen.
(Image source: Wikimedia Commons)
Hans Zimmer and the Duduk
Travis’s Meditation begins with a melancholy scale, low in the duduk’s range, infinitely sad, surrounded by the gentle soundscaping of a long, held chord. The profoundly human quality of the duduk is emphasised by the breathy sounds it sometimes makes, and the quivering vibrato, particularly on the higher notes, reminding us that a human being is creating the sound. It evokes distant centuries and distant lands, but it’s also timeless.
The meeting with the alien on the moor. A still from The Overview film directed by Miles Skarin
At around 1:40, the melody Steven Wilson sings on the words, ‘There was no ghost on the moor’ from Objects Outlive Us (side one of The Overview, 2025) appears, and Travis extends and decorates the theme. A low drone soon establishes itself in the accompaniment, and remains throughout the piece. The duduk rises higher, with gentle passion. The soundscaping becomes more cinematic, in line with Wilson’s view that music is cinema for the ears. The duduk dies away with a fragile, deep, soulful sound, exposing rich, layered soundscaping.
When the duduk returns, it’s more passionate and higher in its range, tender, compassionate and soulful. The emotional effect it creates is similar to that of Clare Torry‘s voice on Pink Floyd’s The Great Gig in the Sky from The Dark Side of the Moon (1973). The soundscaping becomes richer and more layered, reminiscent of parts of another Pink Floyd album, Wish You Were Here (1975), such as the opening of Shine On You Crazy Diamond (Parts I–V).
The piece gradually builds to a series of subtle climaxes; it’s only when looking back to where we started that we realise how far we have travelled in this slow-moving, quietly epic piece. The duduk can become more anguished at times, but then drops away peacefully. The duduk’s silences become as important as its utterances. In an extended passage about halfway through, where the duduk is silent, the soundscape is reminiscent of early Tangerine Dream. The soundscape shimmers, growing more ethereal; melody and meaning are just out of reach.
The duduk creeps back in, and it’s layered and looped; there’s a gorgeous mix of melodies and soundscapes cascading over each other as the ‘No Ghost on the Moor’ theme returns. As the piece reaches its end, there are moments of restless passion, and lovely, long mellow notes.
Listening to the Blu-ray in 5.1 surround sound makes the experience fully immersive; I was shocked when I accidentally pressed a button on my remote which forced the sound to collapse into stereo in front of me, although in stereo the mesmeric qualities of the recording are equally powerful.
The overall effect of the piece is to demand either complete concentration… or none, allowing the sound to permeate the room and seep into the soul. It sometimes feels as if the music bypasses the intellectual parts of the brain and appeals to the more basic, instinctive parts. Whether you listen to the music actively or as an aid to meditation, relaxation or concentration whilst doing other tasks, the effect can be cathartic, leaving you in the state that John Milton describes in his poem, Samson Agonistes (1671),
‘Calm of mind, all passion spent’
Equipment used for this review: LG TV, Marantz NR1711 Receiver, Sony UBP-X800M2 Blu-ray player, Bowers & Wilkins CM8 floorstanding speakers*, Bowers & Wilkins M-1 wall-mounted compact satellite speakers
*As described in the What Hi-Fi review, the speakers have a ‘punchy, weighty bass’, and my listening room is small. My local hi-fi dealer advised that a subwoofer is unnecessary in this set-up; technically, it’s a 5.0 surround sound system rather than a 5.1 system.
Now read on…
Theo Travis live with Soft Machine
Soft Machine Thirteen album review
Travis plays live with Steven Wilson
Travis plays on Wilson’s The Harmony Codex