Name: Gathering at Cerrig-mawr by Trefoil
Duration: 4 min 16 s
Description: In a shallow valley (exactly 53°09'14.8"N 4°23'51.7"W)

This recording has actually haunted me since I first heard it. Incredible stuff !!!

You have a real feeling and knack for touching the transcendent in natural soundscapes. Thanks for enriching my day.

Wonderful, quite amazing and captivating.  Beautiful audio images.

Friday morning, 23rd July 2021. If someone had ever suggested to me to make a dawn recording at this location on a 'normal' Friday morning, I would have exclaimed: "Seriously, are you joking?". This place is so close to the city that a 'normal' Friday morning (and especially so during Winter, with its long nights and short days) would have meant, if exceedingly lucky, something like 70% heavy traffic noise and 30% dawn chorus (including not only birds but an array of various mammals as well).

But here we were, three days into a strict Covid-19 Delta lockdown... Of course, one gets curious. How much difference? After all, from the 'Nature' point of view, as opposed to the 'Human' point of view, it seems fair to say that what is 'normal' is what happens when the 'Human' is not around. In a lockdown situation, 'Human' is still very much around, but rather heavily circumscribed, for his/her own good. And this happens, also, to be beneficial to 'Nature'. So, what might that mean, in terms of 'acoustic ecology'? Well, as it turns out, it means 'a heaven of a lot'.

This excerpt from a much longer recording commences from 06:34, i.e., from mid-Winter's early twilight through to sunrise and after. (The longer recording begins several hours before first light.) Yes, there is some sporadic 'essential' traffic noise to be heard; mainly, as one would expect, in the lower frequencies; and the low-frequency rumble of the occasional 'essential' jet landing at or taking off from the local city airport. But, from this field recordist's perspective, Nature definitely owns this 'Delta' dawn. The overwhelming noise of mechanised humanity has been radically subdued by ... a microscopic virus. Of course, one feels great empathy and sympathy for humanity (after all, one is  human). But the Paradox naturally arises in one's mind, and one naturally reflects and meditates upon it...

If 'Humanity' is, as humans tend to allege, the 'pinnacle of all Nature', why is it that Nature, which utterly grounds and supports all of 'Humanity' and all of its entrepreneurial endeavours, is treated by 'Humanity' as some kind of expendable and disposable raw material, or as rubbish? Isn't it so poetically ironic that 'Humanity' is ultimately quieted not by discussions of 'ecological ethics', not by 'philosophy' - which, as Socrates once said, was born of a sense of 'wonder' at the kosmos - but by a self-concern for survival in the face of a virus that it cannot even perceive with its own natural perceptual senses? But is it really the individual's personal body and life that is of most concern here? Or is it not, rather, the current socio-political economy that is most at risk? Changing this global political economy and its behaviours is clearly not as easy as trying to change the individual body and its behaviours.

This leads to the thought, the question, the problem: What is good for human economy is not necessarily good for natural ecology, and what is good for natural ecology is not necessarily good for human economy. And so, what is to be done?

Such are some traces of the inner reflections and meditations of a field recordist, sitting damp and cold through the night, first light, and dawn, listening in sublimely grateful joy to Nature's 'beautifully musical' voicing of so many 'beautiful' voices... They are simply uttering their existence. They do not conceive of themselves as 'beautiful'. But their intrinsic 'beauty' and 'value', their intrinsic 'music', may be, and arguably should be, best understood from the perspective of a certain 'ecological aesthetics'... 

Best listened to with (good) headphones (with a flat frequency response).

Recorded on the land of the Kaurna people, which is now a Conservation Park.

2021.07.23 A Covid-19 Delta Lockdown Dawn. Winter.

Dawn Live at Queen Elizabeth NP

Erratics & Unconformities

Hangingstones

Vacca Wall

Untold Skies is an artist commission for the Promenade Weekender, 15-17th September 2023

Although Untold Skies was created with Weston’s seafront in mind, it can be enjoyed from any location.

Composed by Tina Hitchens & Jen Green for a walk along the Weston super Mare seafront, Untold Skies is an immersive soundwork offering a creative perspective on the landscape and the sensory experience of Weston’s edgelands. It features the musical and spoken word contributions of workshop participants from Humans of Weston Creative Recovery Group and Weston Artspace woven with the artists’ new work. 

During the Promenade project, a workshop on the seafront involved deep listening exercises and participants made field recordings along the way from bandstand to Birnbeck pier lookout, where we talked about the old pier and did mindful writing. Tina then led music improvisations with a group in Weston Artspace, drawing inspiration from sea and seafront, and Jen led a workshop on writing about what makes Weston unique, the edges, and what the sea brings us.

A booklet with writing from the project is available digitally here: https://issuu.com/untold-skies/docs/untold-skies-booklet

Credits:

Field recordings & spoken words: Martyn, Nada, Reily
Music improvisations: Andy, Bev, Jo, Katie, Nada, Sam, Scarlett, Zena 
Writing and spoken words: Nada Magriel & Sam Francis
Many thanks to Bev of Humans of Weston and to Weston Artspace. 
Additional words by Jen Green www.jencgreen.com 
Field recordings, music composition and production by Tina Hitchens www.tinahitchens.com

Commission by Promenade for the Promenade Weekender, September 2023, and made possible with support from Arts Council England. 
www.promenadeprojects.org.uk/

Untold Skies

In a shallow valley (exactly 53°09'14.8"N 4°23'51.7"W)

Gathering at Cerrig-mawr

One of my all-time favourite moments during a Nocturnal Survey on the Gwent Levels. In the background you'll hear several key species, Lapwing being the main displaying over the fields but Snipe, Teal, Swan, Mallard, Woodcock, Little Owl and Bat Sp's also in the background. With the Lockdown I was able to get a cleaner recording as there were no planes going over but I couldn't escape the sound of a local farmer who was still spreading his fields, hence the droning sound in the background.

Gear; Sound Devices Mixpre 6 ii + Telinga Stereo Mk 3

Gavin Vella

Lapwing Display 25th March MixPre - 903 01

Binaural recording of the 8pm howling in Boulder, Colorado. A single firework blast marks the start, a fifteen second pause, then people come to their balconies and porches to howl.

8pm pandemic howling in Boulder, Colorado

Short excerpts from a recording of fruit bats feeding on the flowers of suburban River Gums, with pitch dropped down one octave and time expanded 200 per cent. No post-processing on the original excerpts, nor after time and pitch shift. Recorded around 01:00, just after rain, in Autumn. (Best listened to with good quality headphones with a flat frequency response.)

(Original recording here: https://soundcloud.com/hearingbeings/20200419-fruit-bats-feeding-on-flowering-suburban-gum-trees-autumn-night-excerpt.)

2020.04.19 Fruit Bats Feeding on Flowering Suburban Gum Trees: Time and Pitch Shifted.

At midnight long, low, lazy Pig Frog grunts echo through a flooded cypress forest in the Big Cypress Preserve, Florida. Recorded July 2020 with matched pair Line Audio CM3 cardioids in NOS stereo & Sound Devices Mix-Pre3, 74 Db gain & no low cut filter.

Flooded Forest Echos

on the outskirts of turpan city. 
https://jeremyh.bandcamp.com/album/june-august-2019

june - august, 2019

wolf spider chorus. yarnaz valley, xinjiang

Tales from the understory
Nocturnal and twilight mostly. 
Recordings by Vince Chanter

Gathering at Cerrig-mawr

Trefoil

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