Field Recording

A moderate wind is sweeping in the high reeds of Makholma shore. Down near the waterline there's absolute calm. The dense reed is working like a perfect windshield made by nature itself. In the background one lonely Whooper Swan is yoking in a rather same manner than in late october when migrating begins.

Recorded by Jan Eerala for www.baltic.fi    Makholma Finland

Recorded with spaced omnis (AT4022 and SD702) 

Reed in wind - 17/6/2014 - Makholma shore

Wind blowing across a reed bed in Shinjocho, Moriyama, Shiga Prefecture, Japan. Details will appear on Shiga Rivers (http://shigarivers.com/).

Wind and Birds in Lower Yasugawa Reeds

Contribution for Future Sequence 8

"Fans of Thomas Koner will surely love this piece by Dutch composer Mendel Kaelen. Deep, expansive bass tones roll through vast and desolated valleys as subtle remnants of fractured and solitary melodies haunt the space like a thick fog slowly dissolving in the aether. The work develops at a slow glacial pace - despite the menace there's hope hidden within the enveloping sheets of sound."

http://www.futuresequence.com/sequence8/

Śūñayaca-tāla (Future Sequence 8, 2014)

Recorded in a dry river bed on the Limpopo river at around 5.45am, about an hour after dawn, on the 28th of November, 2014. 
The dominant birds in this recording are a group of Natal Spurfowl's (Pternistis natalensis), other species calling include: Woodland Kingfisher (Halcyon senegalensis), African Hoopoe (Upupa africana), Red-eyed Dove (Streptopelia semitorquata), Bearded Woodpecker (Dendropicos namaquus), Tropical Boubou (Laniarius aethiopicus), Green Woodhoopoe (Phoeniculus purpureus), Egyptian Goose (Alopochen aegyptiaca), African Fish Eagle (Haliaeetus vocifer), Southern Boubou (Laniarius ferrugineus). There are quite a few other birds calling that I haven't identified yet, mainly all the tweety birds which I always find difficult to identify.
Recorded at Mmabolela Reserve, Limpopo, South Africa, during the 'Sonic Mmabolela' residency organized by Francisco Lopez & James Webb, many thanks to everyone involved in the residency!
And to the people who lent me money which made my involvement possible: Mum, Dad, Oma and Rachael B.

Morning At Umzumbi

vera rifken_ask the dust

A few cicadas (possibly Oxypleura quadraticollis) call together, slowly ascending to an incredibly ear-piercing chorus in which microtones blend in and out of each other to create a surreal high pitched drone which soon descends to quiet. They did this on and off for about an hour with intervals of 5 minutes or so between. This is the last time they called before they fell silent until dawn the next morning, in which they called so loud that they almost distorted my microphones, it was about 2-3 times as loud as the climax in this recording! In the background you can hear the rhythmic chopping sounds of a group of African Scops Owls (Otus senegalensis) calling in the gallery forest by the river bed.
Recorded in a dry section of the Limpopo River, at Mmabolela Reserve, Limpopo, South Africa, around 11.30pm on the 24th of November, 2014.
Recording made during the 'Sonic Mmabolela' residency organized by Francisco Lopez and James Webb.
Many thanks to all those involved with the residency, and to the people who lent me money which made my involvement possible: Mum, Dad, Oma and Rachael B.

Cicadas In The Middle Of The Night

A composition made from sounds recorded recently in Kiama, during a short break while I was heading down to Murramarang National Park on the south coast of NSW. 
A cool Autumn wind sings melodiously through the wires at the viewing platform for the famous Kiama Blowhole, which was exploding large amounts of coastal water out as I recorded this, surrounded by many spectators. Layered with hydrophone recordings I got in a large rock pool a hundred or so metres away. These two recordings were gathered within 30 minutes of each other and since they are so close I feel that they are intimately related. They live side by side every day, yet we would never be able to hear them together without the aid of listening devices such as these microphones.
Recorded between 2:30 and 3:00pm on the 28th of March, 2015. 

Wind Singing In The Wires By The Coast

Artaline - Пронизывающая аудиопростынка метрополитена

Composition made from unprocessed recordings of electronic appliances in my home, recorded with a coil pick-up.
Appliances recorded include, my plasma tv, my computer screen, my external hard drive, my computer mouse, my xbox 360, my freezer, my oven, my stereo amp, my blu-ray player, my heater, my old Yamaha keyboard, etc.

Electromagnetism Inside My Home

Dust Storm Approaching In The Outback

August 18 2015, 7:21 PM. Okavango Delta.

These reed frogs remind me of Xenakis' "Concret PH", an emotionally important work for me (and early example of granular synthesis). They are also "siren frogs" for me, as they always sound really close but end up luring you away from the safety of camp.

Recorded by Brian House (http://brianhouse.net, http://soundcloud.com/brianhouse) for the Okavango Wilderness Project. These sounds are in the public domain and may be downloaded and used for any purpose, but consider linking to our expedition website: http://intotheokavango.org

Equipment used: Sound Devices 702 digital recorder with Sennheiser 418 stereo shotgun microphone (M/S). Post-processing in Logic Audio (editing, normalization, EQ, limiter). Format: 96khz 24-bit WAV. 


Field Recording: Reed Frogs In The Delta

Molluscs crunching and squeaking, salt water being sucked in and out through rocks, black cockatoo's screaming hauntingly, long stretching fences rattling and droning, waves rolling and crashing, european bees buzzing on native flowers, wattlebirds, honeyeaters and froglets singing by a coastal pond, rumbling planes, all these sonic moments and more came together before me on this beautifully warm weekend in late Winter.
Jibbon Head is a small coastal headland at the north edge of the Royal National Park, NSW, Australia. It is surrounded by the suburb of Bundeena and on the other side of the bay the suburb of Cronulla. The main habitats on it include a small area of very endangered littoral forest, a large pond within that forest and coastal heathland.
All sounds recorded with omni's, contact microphones and hydrophones on the 1st and 2nd of August, 2015 and composed in mid August, 2015.

(Winter) Jibbon Head

Excerpt from my new work with Peter Terner, available for free on Impulsive Habitat: http://www.impulsivehabitat.com/releases/ihab109.htm

Thousands Of Maggots Inside A Dead Kudu (excerpt)

A piece from my forthcoming e.p. 'Winter Loops'... .

https://darrenharper.bandcamp.com/album/winter-loops

I Hope you'll enjoy!!

purchase e.p.

The Yearning Loop

While driving up from Calliope to Kroombit Tops National Park (Central Queensland, Australia) we got stuck in the lowlands due to temporarily impassable creeks. In the previous days there had been heavy rain and on this night the heat and humidity was intense. When these elements came together it allowed the subtropical anuran diversity of this place to really shine and the frogs of the area puffed up their throats and consumed the sonic space of the lowlands. The habitat of the lowlands is a mixture of subtropical woodland and farmland for grazing cattle.
In this particular chorus a stunningly large group of Desert Tree Frogs (Litoria rubella) screamed from a pond below while several species of Rocket Frogs (Litoria sp.) excitedly chattered in a roadside ditch. Also accompanying the chorus's included a Green Tree Frog (Litoria caerulea) chanting close to the mics as well as Roth's Tree Frogs (Litoria rothi), Eastern Dwarf Tree Frogs (Litoria fallax) and Salmon-striped Frogs (Limnodynastes salmini) singing in the surrounds. 
Unfortunately I wasn't able to record much of the many incredible lowland chorus's as I was on a scientific expedition so didn't have much time or freedom to record on this night, a night on which I heard more frog species over a few hours than I likely have over my entire life!
Recorded on the 31st of January, 2016.
Many thanks to Stephen Mahony (who also came along on the trip) for assisting me in ID'ing the frog calls, you should check out his amazing photos! https://www.flickr.com/photos/stephenmahony/

A Sound Emerged From The Wet, Warm Earth

A NOAA-led study recently recorded these sounds from Challenger Deep--the deepest known point in the ocean.

CD - Ship

striped marsh frogs/northern banjo frog/aquatic life
wet season in the kroombit mountains, qld
february, 2016

Morning Chorus: Above and below a creek in the Kroombit mountains

Inside/outside a strand of very noisy Casuarinas on the edge of a coastal headland in Murramarang National Park, NSW, Australia.
Captured with omni's/contact mics on the 1st of April, 2015, a beautiful afternoon on the south coast..
My deepest respect to the rightful owners of this land, the Yuin people, past and present, who used to live and roam across this beautiful place.

The Casuarinas Crackled And Whispered On A Windswept Headland

During my trip to work this morning I decided to use my newly received Elektrouši and discovered an rich world of drones, beeps and buzzes

Electromagnetic Fields Of A Bus

These are the sounds of bamboo in wind at Matapalo, Costa Rica - a straight ten minute recording. I recorded to a Sound Devices 722 deck using JrF contact microphones, attaching the mics to a pair of separate 7" diameter bamboo stalks five feet apart and seven feet above ground within a large clump of forty or so 50 footers. There was a tropical afternoon breeze, peaking in amplitude about every 4 minutes, and what a world of sound travels through those vascular inner fibers. The recordings are gorgeous and alive on their own but I expect to morph these into tectonic groans for experimental audio installations and musical applications.

Bamboo in Wind  (Stereo Contact Mics)

Producer since 1982 of early-computer, industrial, tribal, techno and soundtrack music

Field Recording

Paul H Williams