A Cumbrian-based arts organisation is leading the way in an exciting project drawing attention to the unique sounds of special places across Europe and beyond.
Barrow-based sound art and new music organisation, Full of Noises, is the lead partner of Acoustic Commons, which brings the sounds of Walney Island, London, France and Slovenia into your home or on the move from next month.
Anyone listening to the live environmental streams online will be able to hear sounds from four microphone streaming boxes at South Walney Nature Reserve; Stave Hill Ecological Park in London; Frioul Islands in the Bay of Marseille in France, and Tivoli, Rožnik and Šiška Hill Landscape Park in Ljublijana, Slovenia.
The soundscapes, available 24 hours a day, will range from seabirds to a water pumping station.
On Walney and other sites, the microphones are in locations deliberately inaccessible to the public so the sounds can only be heard via the streams which are a permanent pair of ears for those unable to travel.
“The Acoustic Commons streams provide privileged listening spots in remote places and are a low carbon footprint way to travel to a place by listening,” said Glenn Boulter, Full of Noises artistic director.
A special underwater microphone, known as a hydrophone, will be placed in one of the lagoons left by the industrial extraction of salt, sand and gravel during the 19th and 20th centuries, on the southernmost tip of South Walney Island, giving listeners unique access to a surprising underwater soundscape full of clicks, plops and gurgles.
“The lagoon stream will let us into an unseen world, beneath the water, where natural processes and creatures produce an ever changing and mysterious soundscape,” said Andrew Deakin, Full of Noises programme director.
Depending on conditions, diving birds, starfish, tiny spider crabs, fish and marine invertebrates might be heard as well the movement of the tide and occasionally the distant sound of human activity.
The project is supported by the European Union’s Creative Europe programme and each of the four arts organisations involved has close links to a specific site of cultural and/or natural heritage interest.
It’s hoped that everyone from birdwatchers and walkers to local residents and tourists will enjoy the sounds of a shingle beach facing the Atlantic Ocean when listening to the Walney stream.
Although the microphones are inaccessible, signs will identify the sites when the COVID-19 restrictions are lifted, and information sheets and boards will be provided for visitors.
Acoustic Commons aims to identify and open up common land as sites for sharing cultural activities as well as forming bridges between places and making communities feel less isolated.
The live streams will be launched on April 9 at http://acousticommons.net/streams.html
