AceBreakingNews – When Mark Atkins dreamt of carefully crafting a new rendition of the Last Post with the didgeridoo, he wasn’t sure whether Australia would be ready to hear it.

Ace Press News From Cutting Room Floor: Published: Nov.11: 2023: ABC South East NSW: TELEGRAM Ace Daily News Link https://t.me/+PuI36tlDsM7GpOJe

The Yamatji, Widi and Wongi didgeridoo player, who lives in Tamworth in New South Wales, wanted to acknowledge the camaraderie shared between Indigenous and non-Indigenous soldiers during war times.

His idea was also to honour the service and sacrifice made by Indigenous soldiers, despite facing discrimination and ignorance.

“I told my daughter, ‘I don’t know if the time is right, and she said, ‘The time is right now,’ Atkins said.

James Morrison on bugle, Mark Atkins on didgeridoo

Atkins and jazz virtuoso James Morrison recorded the arrangement 200-metres high, on the Sydney Opera House, and were filmed for thousands, if not millions, of people across the nation.

The Last Post (Winds of Change) piece features a didgeridoo and bugle complementing one another and was released at the 11th hour this Remembrance Day.’

“ People ask, ‘How did it come about?’” Atkins said.

“I suppose that was in 67, when I noticed something was wrong because my uncles and aunties couldn’t march or join in on the celebrations.

“My uncles and aunties could go and fight alongside these fellas and die with them but then come back and get treated entirely different.”

Atkins’s paternal grandfather served for four years as a machine gunner in World War I, a role in which people had just a 20 per cent chance of survival.

Atkins also has uncles and aunties that served on his mother’s side.

“This new arrangement was created to help ensure memories of the First Nations soldiers and Anzacs who fought — side by side — live on,” he said.

Family project

His daughter Chelsy Atkins, from Wallagoot on the NSW far south coast, helped to manage and co-produce the project.

The Yamatji, Widi and Wongi woman said it was a painful history to look back on, but that was why this project was so important.

“We wanted to look forward into the future … [at] what’s going to support unity and togetherness moving forward?” she said.

“ How can we represent what it was like on the battlefield where they were unified, they were together, they were brothers in arms.”

Ms Atkins and her husband Ricky Bloomfield became quickly inspired by Mark Atkins’ dream and helped produce the piece together.

They carefully put the version of the Last Post together with “balance” so the song would have a profound impact.

The didgeridoo isn’t overpowering the bugle and the bugle isn’t overpowering the didgeridoo, there’s just this wonderful balance representing unity and respect,” Ms Atkins said.

James Morrison, who plays the bugle in the piece, said it was wonderful the project wasn’t trying to replace anything.

“It’s bringing things together; a great tradition that’s already there with another much older tradition, and blending them, and it’s such a powerful message because of that,” he said.

Hopes it will be played nationwide

Three years of consultation went into the making of the piece, including with the RSL.

I think it has the ability to be a healing acknowledgement to bring people and communities together and gain a deeper understanding and respect for each other.”

Mr Bloomfield, the audio engineer and producer, said he helped to capture the music in a unique way, incorporating the vibrations of the floorboards the didgeridoo was sitting on.

“The didgeridoo has never been recorded in this way before, so listening to the recording … I’m really proud of how it turned out.”

Mr Bloomfield hopes the project will help to unify the nation this Remembrance Day and on Anzac Days to come.

“We wanted this to be an addition, something we could honour the camaraderie of First Nations figures and Australian figures [with] and be inspired by the example they set.

“They were unified on the battlefield, we can be unified today.”

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