Chris Williams
didgeridoo & composer
Chair Sponsor: Kay Feeney & Michelle May QC

A descendant of the Wakka Wakka people from Queensland, Australia, Didgeridoo player Chris Williams, began his music studies from an early age. He studied Classical Trumpet at the Queensland Conservatorium of Music and also earned a Masters degree in Classical Trumpet Performance at the Royal College of Music in London.

Chris has appeared as guest principal trumpet with the Hong Kong Sinfonietta, the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra, the Queensland Symphony Orchestra and the Queensland Pops Orchestra and the Australian Youth Orchestra. He was nominated for the Australian Freedman Fellowship Award for Jazz and for the Australian Young
Achiever Award twice. Currently Artist in Residence with the Southern Cross Soloists, Chris is regarded as one of Australia’s leading Didgeridoo soloists. As a Didgeridoo soloist, Chris has performed extensively throughout Africa and Europe. 

 

Solo Didgeridoo performance highlights include Westminster Abbey, Buckingham Palace, Israel, the Vatican and Didgeridoo Concerto with the Queensland Symphony Orchestra. From 2022, in partnership with the Southern Cross Soloists, Chris has embarked on an ambitious project to collaborate with established composers to commission 3 new works for didgeridoo and classical music ensemble every year for the next 10 years.
A number of works so far in the “Didgeridoo Commissioning Project” have been nominated for APRA AMCOS Awards. Current and previous composers include Sean O’Boyle, John Rotar, Leah Curtis, Joe Twist, Matthew Dewey, and James Morrison.

He lives on the beautiful Sunshine Coast/Gubbi Gubbi country with his family.