The work contained in this CD redefines our notions of underwater life by presenting a world of sophisticated communication within a habitat filled by a plethora of intelligent species. Pollardstown Fen is one of Western Europe's last remaining calcium-rich spring-fed fens, a 550-acre alkaline marsh within a glacial valley in Ireland. Tom Lawrence introduces us to this fascinating underwater environment though ten extended tracks recorded in various locations around the Fen. In most cases, Lawrence identifies the beetles we're hearing; he's dug into the research in order to understand as much as possible about what he's encountered there, though a bit of interpretive license is also employed as he interprets some of the strange and wonderful sounds of these tiny creatures. If you've enjoyed David Dunn's insect projects (Angels and Insects, underwater; The Sound of Light in Trees, in pinyon pines), then this disc will take you even further into the beautiful and surprisingly varied sonic world of our miniscule insect brethren.
A two-CD suite that offers a deep immersion into the voice of the planet, featuring career highlights from 19 of the world's premier nature sound recordists and soundscape producers. This specially-priced set includes a 48-page booklet of reflections from the artists, essays on soundscapes, and detailed track notes, creating a context for deeper enjoyment.
Ten years after his groundbreaking Voices of the Rainforest (Ryko/The World, 1991), which featured songs of the Bosavi people in the context of their natural soundscape, Steven Feld returns with his pure environmental sound follow-up. Four extended immersions into the quieter times of day draw us into the rich sonic interplay of birds, insects, The most traditional natural sound release in our collection. Long tracks offer relaxing ambience, yet also reward attentive listening.
Enter a previously unknown sound world: the insides of piñon pine trees, where the trees’ circulatory systems, branches moving in the breeze, and a wide variety of insects create a soundscape that is at once strangely familiar and utterly alien.
Recorded midnight to midnight on a single day by 36 recordists on four continents, this graceful mix is delightfully ordinary yet surprising, featuring casual everyday voices like birds, neighborhoods, and sleet on the window, as well as human creativity with sound, including a wave organ and a tunnel singer. The Day of Sound project has been featured on All Things Considered (an early 8-minute mix of this project) and The New York Times Online (a millennial project recorded over a two day period).
The next step in music/nature collaborations, as Nature becomes a player in the band, creating a compelling “earth jazz” that rises from the powerful soundscapes of a living planet. For many years, David Rothenberg (Sudden Music, Terra Nova, Why Birds Sing) has explored the meeting places of music and nature in his writing and music. Now world-class field recordist Douglas Quin (Antarctica, Forests) joins him, improvising not over chord changes, but sound changes.
EarthEar is helping sell the last few dozen copies of this ambitious and rewarding multimedia project produced after Vear accompanied a British science team to Antarctica. Includes the half-hour title film and soundscape (with three viewing options), several shorter films, as well as a CD featuring extended tracks of source recordings that are themselves utterly engrossing.
Strange and beautiful soundscapes from beneath the waters of one of Western Europe's last alkaline fens. Lawrence shares a previously unexplored acoustic habitat, with engaging descriptions of the species and locations on each track.
A soundscape from Kyoto’s Enko-ji Temple, this multitrack composition is composed from recordings of a suikinkutsu (underground water-zither, often installed in consort with a hand-washing basin) and ambient recordings of cicadas.
In Brazil’s disappearing Atlantic Rainforest, this important preserve is home to several species of primates, including half the world’s population of the wooly spider monkey. The CD presents a day in the life of the forest, beginning with the dawn bird chorus along a small stream. Striking primate sounds fill the afternoon, which ends with a shower and an evening of rhythmic, ringing frog calls.
A straight-forward and varied rainforest disc, presented with a clarity and quality that is a cut above.
A groundbreaking combination of field recordings from forests in Madagascar, Africa, and Brazil, interwoven with sections of composed and improvised music that evokes connection and tunes our ears to the dynamics of nature's language. In subtle ways, even the day-cycle of "natural" sound at the heart of this 56-minute work is composed, as Quin employs various electronic, structural, and emotional approaches to "play" the soundscape itself.
David Monacchi takes us on a very personal journey, into both the diverse sonic world itself (with pieces focusing by turn on water, insects, birds, whales, and rainforests), and the creative possibilities available to composers inspired by these voices around us.
Some of the richest interspecies music to emerge in recent years, featuring stellar humpback whale calls, richly evocative violin played in underwater canyons, and subtle electronic touches. Lisa Walker is a classically trained violinist who spent four years doing field research on whale songs. Walker’s stellar recordings of the whales include both mating and feeding calls; the melodies and rhythms of her compositions are elaborations and reflections of themes found in the whale songs.
EarthEar is pleased to be keeping this classic disc in circulation. At the time that Dunn released it on his own in 1995, it immediately became an essential expression of his singular approach. Exploring the persistence of spirit in the landscape and culture of Zimbabwe, the disc is at once deeply sensitive and entirely free of romanticism, rooted in current cultural and ecological conditions.
This ongoing series of releases is the most comprehensive, and engaging, exploration of the roles of bells in society. Feld weaves soundscape compositions that exist both as “real-time” experiences featuring animal, church, and festival bells, and also as reflections on the ways that bells have had an impact over the course of centuries.
Focus is largely on rural bells and the ways that bells shape daily, seasonal, and ceremonial time.
EarthEar's newest artist collaboration release features sounds recorded near Panama City, in a former military base turned open space. Sound artist Jay Needham has been traveling there for several years, working with local residents to raise awareness of this nearby landscape through listening and recording.
A straightforward day cycle in a rich soundscape, including monkeys in early morning, a bamboo forest at mid-day, cicadas at dusk, and night ambiences.
Italian educator and musician Mariolina Zitta weaves a magnificent, sensitive, musical tapestry centered on the songs and spaces of bats. Beginning with recordings of bats made by American researcher William Gannon, Zitta has woven recordings of cave ambiences with a sensitive music-making using didgeridoo, voice, logs, bone whistles, seed rattles, and ringing stalactites, creating some of the most accessible yet also authentic interspecies music we have heard at EarthEar.
I am a longtime listener of nature sounds, with close to 400 CDs in my collection. I love all the discs I have gotten from EarthEar to date. I must congratulate you on The Dream s of Gaia: it is solidly produced, extensively annotated, beautifully packaged. A first rate job in all respects.