Xavier Rudd to headline Solstice At The Mount 2023
We are incredibly excited to announce that Xavier Rudd will be headlining our Opening Ceremony concert 'Solstice At The Mount' taking place on Wednesday 21st June 2023 at Wasing's beautiful new woodland amphitheatre, The Mount. Occurring on the same day everywhere on the planet, the Solstice connects everyone in a truly global moment.
At Wasing we see things differently. That we are inherently part of nature and that what harms the planet ultimately harms us; everything is connected. And it is from this alternative narrative in an ever-changing world that the iconic Mount was born as a fresh and pioneering space for people and planet to connect, unplugged from everyday reality.
Solstice At The Mount will inaugurate this beautiful new space and begin our journey into providing immersive musical experiences in the heart of nature. We invite you to join us for an incredibly special, alcohol-free evening where we will celebrate music from different parts of the world with vibrant cuisine in a unique, natural setting; connected, present and in the moment.
Australian singer/songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Xavier Rudd, the incredible one-man band, will perform his intoxicating blend of folk, blues and reggae supporting social consciousness, environmental issues and Aboriginal rights. We're such fans of Xavier and his awe-inspiring music is perfectly suited to the launch of our incredible new venue.
“When I first got successful I was surprised, because I thought what I was doing was more like art,” he says. I was experimenting with didges and gaffa-taping them to chairs and I always had this real love for wood and the tones of wood, so it was all very earthy.”
Those instinctive beginnings eventually yielded the more crafted and purposeful likes of Spirit Bird, Nanna (with his nine-piece band the United Nations), Storm Boy and seven more live albums — though nobody could ever count those early bootlegs swapped by fans from Argentina to the Czech Republic, serving to double his audience on each return.
Today, Xavier’s relentless upward arc is among the most astounding success stories of our time. Countless more celebrated acts have come and gone like fireworks as his campfire steadily grows: a beacon to the kind of music fan that seeks sustenance in a fast-food world.
“I value the simple things in life,” he shrugs. “I value community, culture, our connection to the earth as human beings. I don’t care too much for the other stuff. I think the roots of who we are, and what our ancestral lines are and how those stories have shaped us are the most important things. And I guess I always celebrate those things in my music.”
As a child, at one with the sea and sand, inventing songs for his own enjoyment, Xavier set the tone for a life where creation was its own reward, and a gift not taken lightly. “I’ve always felt like I’ve had this old woman spirit with me that that is prevalent in my music, and I’m a vessel for that old woman to speak,” he explains, not for the first time as others try to understand his innate connection to his craft.
“I don’t need to understand who that is or what that is, I just need to be a clean, strong vessel for that to come through, and be humble about it; to realise it’s something that resonates within me and I just need to hold space for it, not let my ego get in the way.”
The spiritual conviction was there long before Xavier discovered the unsettled legacy of his paternal great grandmother, who would disappear from public records after being taken from her Wiradjuri homelands to Melbourne. “There’s stuff we’ll never know,” he says. But awareness of his ancestry, in all its myriad threads, clearly informs not just the earthy tools but the profoundly inclusive message of his music.
“The thing is, in Australia, a lot of us come from tough stories, no matter where we’re from,” he says. “The convict stuff is easy to find because it was documented but Indigenous history isn’t. But I feel sorry for everyone in this country. No matter what our bloodline is, everyone’s been denied culture.”
“I feel like with this record, I’ve been able to be really creative and I’m excited about what I’m making just because I’ve had time,” Xavier says. “I’ve had the chance to do it all myself, which I haven’t done since Spirit Bird in terms of instrumentation and stuff, so I’ve been getting a bit trippy with an analog synthesizer…”
There’s the sound of nature in its purest form, too, in the birdsong that continues to weave its spell through Stoney Creek and elsewhere. “I use birds a lot,” he says. “Often they won’t sound like birds. I use a lot of natural sounds, from everywhere. It’s sometimes hard to determine what they are, but the record is full of them.
“I’ve been here long enough to realise that for some people, what I’m saying in my music really resonates,” he says. “You know, all of our ancestors around the planet have come from some form of struggle and we carry that, all of us, years on. We’ve all got stuff to heal. And I think music is the greatest medicine on the planet.”
- Xavier Rudd
Credit: Bio @ xavierrudd.com
To find out more about Xavier and his incredible music, click here
To find out more about Solstice At The Mount and the venue, click here
For all enquiries, please email events@wasing.co.uk
Location: The Mount, Wasing Lane, Near Reading, Berkshire, RG7 4LY, U.K.
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