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Sound-oriented sites we thought you might enjoy. Please email us to suggest other sites for addition to this list. For your convenience, we now group these links in the following categories: Sound Mapping / Live Sound OnlineOpen Sound New Orleans - Yet another ear-opener in the recent surge of online soundmaps, and by gorey, this one might just be my favorite of them all! Could be due to a bit more personal connection to the city in question (visits, friends who've lived there), could be the quality of the sounds presented, or could be just that N'orleans is one of the more interesting urban communities out there. [WEBSITE] London Sound Survey - Perhaps the most ambitious and comprehensive approach to sound mapping I've yet to see, this site has several faces: A grid map of London, from which you can both graphically see the nature of the soundscape in different parts of the city, and click to hear all sounds recorded in each grid cell. Sounds are separately collected into "Sound Actions," grouped by category, such as economic, or political, or social, or religious sounds; in each category, you can peruse an annotated list, and click to play what interests you. A section of "Historical" sounds consists of excerpts of books and diaries from the 11th century on, again divided into useful categories (sounds of street and town, communal living, river traffic, plague/war/disaster). A blog features posts on topics such as the decline of whistling, and philosophical subway ("tube") announcements. An all-around wonderful site! [WEBSITE] Listen to Africa - Part of an ongoing travel blog project by a couple bicycling through Africa. Beginning in May 2009 in Morocco, they are working their way down into West Africa, adding recordings at a steady but not too-frenetic pace. A site well worth book marking and returning to every couple of weeks or month. [WEBSITE] Listening to the Deep Ocean Environment (LIDO) - European network of ocean observatories, with audio available for online listening. [WEBSITE] The Smalls Street Sounds - Their goal is to inspire more compelling use of sound in film-making; to this end, they're sponsoring a film competition using the sounds collected on their site. [WEBSITE] Cinco Cidades Soundmap - Unique project from Portugal, featuring a wide variety of sounds recorded in five cities; you can listen to one at a time, or create your own mix of up to five sound loops at a time. [WEBSITE] BBC Save Our Sounds - This BBC soundmapping project launched in June 2009, and is rapidly gathering sound files from around the world. In addition to the sound map, the main site features radio features from the concurrent series on BBC radio and a Desperately Seeking Sounds feature, in which visitors ask the global recording community to help them find sounds that they miss from their past or need for a current project. Despite the big sponsor, this site’s sounds load more sluggishly than many other grassroots soundmaps out there, but there are some nice clips being sent in. [WEBSITE] Radio Aporee - This site is beautiful, if a bit opaque to navigate. Clicking into the site will land you smack-dab into a fairly close up view of a city streetscape, with a few red dots denoting sound files uploaded from particular locations. Zoom out and you’ll see this neighborhood shrink down, while the red dots proliferate across the country, continent, and planet. Click on any dot to listen in. One of the cooler features is soundwalks, in which the “red dot sound files” fade out and in as you wander down the street! [WEBSITE] Montreal Sound Map - Another new community sound-mapping project, fueled by good ol' Google Maps, this from Canada's old city of Montreal. [WEBSITE] Cologne Sound Map - Local sound mapping project on a Google Earth interface. [WEBSITE] Mississauga Sound Map - First of several planned sound maps from the Canadian Society for Acosutic Ecology, this one focuses on a suburb of Toronto. Field recordings are indicated by ear-icons on a Google Maps image. [GO THERE] Hudson Valley Sound and Story Project - Aural history of the Hudson Valley, from New York to Albany. Mostly verbal recollections so far, but the intent is to record more sounds themselves, including sounds nominated by residents. [GO THERE] The Silence of the Lands - Interesting "acoustic cartography" project based in Boulder, with related projects underway in Devon and Plymouth, UK. Website includes background on the research approach, community engagement, academic papers, and maps with sound files (Firefox optimized). [WEBSITE] WhaleSong.net - Broadcasts live humpback whale songs from off the coast of Maui. [WEBSITE] Orca Live.net - Broadcasts live orca sounds from British Columbia, courtesy of Paul Spong's hydrophone system. [WEBSITE] Campaign to Protect Rural England Tranquility Program - The CPRE Tranquility program has pulled together an impressive array of data and public input into a series of "tranquility maps" and publications aimed at promoting the value of tranquility and the need to protect it before it's over run. The work being done by these folks deserves extended study by anyone working with public responses to noise. [WEBSITE] [BROCHURE] [MAPPING TRANQUILITY REPORT(60p. PDF)] [SAVING TRANQUIL PLACES (12p PDF)] Radio Aporee - A wild and cool project, which collects sounds recorded by cell phone and plots them on a Google Maps interface; includes hundreds of recordings from all around the world. [WEBSITE] Live Antarctic Ocean Streaming Audio - The Alfred Wegener Institute streams live audio from four solar and wind powered hydrophones off the Antarctic coast. [WEBSITE] Memoryscapes - Enjoy two of the most dramatic riverside walks in London and hear the voices of people whose lives have been entwined with the Thames. These sound walks take place at two of the most contrasting stretches of river in London. DRIFTING begins in the peaceful surroundings of Hampton Court Palace and DOCKERS ends up in the rarely explored industrial landscape of the Greenwich peninsula. [WEBSITE] [INTERVIEW WITH TOBY BUTLER, MEMORYSCAPES CREATOR] Sounds of New York - Collection of short sound recordings from ferries, subways, streets. [WEBSITE] Soundseeker - GoogleMaps-based collection of sound recordings made around greater New York; includes dozens of recordings, 30-120 seconds each. [WEBSITE] Audible Frequency - A simple, nicely annotated collection of field recordings, easily accessed via MP3; mostly urban ambiences, recorded around Chicago. [WEBSITE] A Sound Walk Across Natural California - Nicely designed Flash-based presentation of California's diverse habitats, including sound, pictures, and text, from the Oakland Museum. [WEBSITE] Atlas Musicalis Project - Electroacoustic bioregionalism from Minas Gerais, Brazil. Paulo Motta weaves field recordings, geographical data, and historical context into a sound suite that gives voice to the landscape of the earth and time. [WEBSITE] Sound Archives/Libraries(see also our page of recordings, including institutional sound libararies: [GO THERE]) Macaulay Library Animal Sound Visualizer - A nifty QuickTime plug in allows visitors to explore the world of animal sound in stunning new ways. While listening to an animal call or song (and often watching an accompanying video), you can watch in real time as a curser moves across the spectrogram showing the structure of the sounds. You can even slow down or speed up the playback from .25x to 8x! From the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, home of one of the most comprehensive collections of bioacoustics recordings. [WEBSITE] FindSounds.com - New search engine that specializes in finding sound files in several different formats, by word or "sounds like"; search results are imperfect (apparently not recognizing quotation marks and so returning results for any word in a multi-word search, such as "beaked whale"), but it's a start. The company also offers a Windows-only program to organize the sounds you collect. [GO THERE] Ocean Conservation Research Sound Library - A great set of ocean sound samples, in three categories: Fish, Mammals, Human, with songrams to better see the "shape" of the sound. [WEBSITE] Xeno-Canto - Incredible colleciton of bird songs and calls from the tropics of the Americas. You can browse for particular birds, or peruse biodiversity maps that identify recording locations. Includes over a hundred hours of recordings, of close to three thousand species. [GO THERE] Library of Vanished Sounds - Part of a great "turn of the millenium" Soundscapes (be)for(e) 2000 Festival in the Netherlands, this extensive library of RealAudio and WAV files includes everything from old letterpresses to horse-pulled street cars and vintage radio broadcasts of historic events. Follow the link on the left side of the main page. [WEBSITE] British Library Archival Sound Recordings - Incredible collections of sounds, ranging from regional dialects to ethnographic recordings, animals, Jewish survivors of the Holocaust, and soundscapes. [WEBSITE] Science and SoundRadio Sounds from Saturn - A single, simple page featuring a sonogram and an audio clip that compresses 27 minutes of radio emissions from the ringed planet into a 73-second listening experience. [WEBSITE] The Sounds of Science - A two-part BBC audio series subtitled "An investigation into acoustics research." Each show includes several topics, including (amongh others) the biological origins of music, sounds from space, sand sounds, and Peter Cusack's sounds from dangerous places. [WEBSITE] Ari Daniel Shapiro - Ari's an ocean bioacoustician who has turned his talents toward making compelling science radio pieces, which very often involve listening to the wild. His website links to articles, podcasts (his own and in service to insitutions such as WHOI), radio pieces heard on NPR, and recently, TV segments from WGBH. [WEBSITE] Fish Sounds of New England - A great collection of "soniferous fishes" recorded in both ocean and freshwater habitats in New England. Many of the sounds have yet to be linked to their species of origin, as acoustic studies of fish is still a very new field. Follow links from this page to learn more about the research behind them. [WEBSITE] Singing Sand Dunes - Two sites that focus on the oft-noticed sounds of sand in motion, whether by wind or footsteps. The first [WEBSITE] is more academic in nature, and the second [WEBSITE] more artistic, but both feature nice sounds. NPS Soundscape Studies in Yellowstone - A page on the Yosemite website describing the work they did over the past two summers to assess the soundscapes in the park. And that’s not all! There’s also a link to a half-hour MP3 file/podcast featuring the NPS Natural Sounds Program’s lead scientist, Kurt Fristrup, talking about his studies of the effect of noise on predator-prey relationships (a line of research that I tell people about more often than nearly any other), as well as noise effects on animal communications and human physiology. The audio feature also addresses the acoustic health of Yosemite as well as some interesting discoveries made possible through recordings made in the wilderness. [WEBSITE] [MP3 INTERVIEW] OrcaSound.net - Features a map with locations of several research sites offering live and archived sound and video from Puget Sound and BC. A highlight is the Lime Kiln Lighthouse page, with live stream, along with a great collection of shorter clipes, highlights from their archives. [WEBSITE] Sons de Mar - See how ship traffic and whales interact off the coast of Spain in this fascinating Flash animation site from a whale research lab. [WEBSITE] Space Audio - University of Iowa collection of sound from space, including Voyager and Cassini recordings of radio and plama ion waves. [WEBSITE] Listening to Birds - A two-year anthropological study based at the University of Aberdeen (Scotland) is exploring the relationships that people have with bird songs and calls. The project's blog is off to a dynamic start, with many interesting posts, and they are actively soliciting contributions from anyone, worldwide. [WEBSITE] [BLOG] Archaeoacoustics Sites - Archaeoacoustics is the study of the acoustic properties in and around archaeological sites, including neolithic stone circles (which often exhibit sound focusing), underground chambers (where there are often amplification or attenuation effects), and rock art sites (where echoes may have evoked spirits). Example: Easter Aquorthies: The project sought to confirm the presence of a distinctive echo that seemed to originate from the recumbent stone. To test this a loudspeaker was positioned near to the recumbent block and set to emit 'pink noise' whilst a series of recordings were taken across the interior of the circle. The arrangement of stones act rather like a stage in a theatre. In addition to providing an impressive visual backdrop to activities within the circle, these megaliths reflect and enhance sound. Sounds could also be heard echoing between other stones, creating a peculiar effect which could easily be generated by clapping, using the voice or by simple musical instruments. Interestingly, people outside the circle would not have been able to hear these sound effects. Aaron Watson Neolithic UK site studies [WEBSITE] [ANOTHER WATSON SITE] Steven J. Waller's Rock Art Site, US [WEBSITE] Victor Reijes recordings analysis [WEBSITE] Archaeoacoustics Yahoo Group [WEBSITE] Scripps Institute Whale Acoustics Center - From the Marine Physical Laboratory, a library of whale vocalizations, presented beautifully with spectrograms. [WEBSITE] Voices in the Sea - A beautiful Flash presentation of information on several families of cetaceans, including dolphins, beaked whales, blue whales, and humpbacks. Includes short videos of Scripps researchers introducing each family, and sound files. [WEBSITE] Space Audio - Favorite sounds from Don Gurnett, a long-time academic researcher, presented as sonograms, sound files, and java-based animations tracking the sounds across the sonogram. Features all the classics, from earth-based ionospheric VLF recordings to Cassini at Saturn and Voyager at the termination shock of the solar wind on the extremities of the solar system. [WEBSITE] SpaceSounds, DinosaurSounds, StormSounds - For the developers of this series of nicely designed sites, it all started with the sounds of space. Online navigation around the cosmos and globe triggers samples of pieces based on space probe radio frequency data, paleontology evidence, and good old fashioned field recording. CDs are also available. [SPACESOUNDS WEBSITE] [DINOSAURSOUNDS WEBSITE] [STORMSOUNDS WEBSITE] Acoustic Environments in Change - In 1975, some of the pioneers of soundscape studies visited and documented the acoustic environment in five European villages; in 2000, a new crop of students re-visted the same towns. This well-designed site shares what they found, in words and sound clips. [WEBSITE] The Sounds of Earth - Sound files of the LP sent with the Voyager space probe, containing a sonic overview of 20th century life on Earth. [WEBSITE] Art/ScienceWild Sound Stories - Six-minute audio and visual excursions into particular habitats, from Bay Area sound artist Gina Farr, collaborating with other artists including Dan Dugan, Lang Elliott, and Bernie Krause. [WEBSITE] Thousand Mile Song: Whale Song Site - David Rothenberg's site to accompany his book by the same name. Includes essays, videos, and audio. [WEBSITE] See also article in Orion on Rothenberg's music with belugas, including sounds [WEBSITE] NightinGala - Essay with sound samples about a June 2008 gathering of musicians and ornithologists in Finland, exploring the Nightingale song from many perspectives. (From Terrain, a great online publication.) The event website as well includes abstracts, but no full papers or sound files. [ESSAY] [NIGHTINGALA WEBSITE] Listening to Birds - A two-year anthropological study based at the University of Aberdeen (Scotland) is exploring the relationships that people have with bird songs and calls. The project's blog is off to a dynamic start, with many interesting posts, and they are actively soliciting contributions from anyone, worldwide. [WEBSITE] [BLOG] 90 Degrees South - New York-based sound artist Andrea Polli, whose work often centers around natural systems, is in Antarctica for much of December and January. She is posting regularly, with short notes and many sound files: some field recordings, many intereviews with scientists about their work, and about listening. The sound files take a little while to load, but it's worth the patience (let the page load while you read the posts or do something else); once loaded, you can click to listen on the page, or download the MP3s to listen at your leisure. [WEBSITE] John Bullitt EarthSoundArt - Creator of the DeepEarthDome, a 3D immersive sound installation that puts the listener inside the earth, as earthquakes and other crustal seismic sounds resonate all around, and the CD EarthSounds, has a wonderfully diverse website that features not only sounds of the earth's interior, but a rich collection of other recordings and reflections. [GO THERE] Sound Sense of Place - A collaboration between the Detroit Zoo and the Canbrook Academy of Art, this site contains two collections of recordings by David Dunn, all of which are available for download and use in compositions. [WEBSITE] SunRings, Kronos/Riley Multimedia Extravaganza - Gurnett worked with NASA, which commissioned Terry Riley to compose a work based on his recordings. As performed by the Kronos Quartet since 2002, this evening-length piece is accompanied by dramatic imagery, and serves as a meditation on our planet's place in the cosmos. Includes links to a pre-performance lecture featuring all the scientific and creative participants. [WEBSITE] Brood X - A collection of photos and recordings of the great cicada swarms of 2004. [WEBSITE] Pulse of the Planet - One of the longest-standing projects in America relating to soundscapes, Jim Metzner's daily NPR sound capsule has brought the joy of listening into millions of lives. In addition to the daily 2 minute piece, Jim does regular stories and features on Weekend Edition, and his book/CD by the same name celebrates the extraordinary range of sounds on our living planet. Most stories are available online [WEBSITE] Sound ArtistsResonating Bodies - A fascinating art/science gallery installation and website from a group of Toronto sound and video artists and pollinator experts. Hear music made with bees, see beautiful and engaging "Bee Trading Cards" and Bee DNA Bar Codes. [WEBSITE] One Sound Each Day - Just what it says it is, with Taylor Deupree of the label 12k posting a short recording each day of 2008, ranging from a friend's vinyl-cutting machine to birds outside the window. [WEBSITE] Sound is Art - Relatively new and very promising site put together by Margaret Noble, who is bringing together a fantastic array of new and archival sound experiences. [WEBSITE] Soundwalkers (film) - A work in progress from film-maker Raquel Castro, featuring interview clips (with academics, artists, and a blind man)and evocative audio explorations of our sounding world, all oriented toward encouring more creative and aware listening. [WEBSITE Bay Area Sound Ecology - Website of a group of sound artists and nature sound recordists in the San Francisco Bay Area. Includes audio of presentations by visiting sound artists. [WEBSITE] Marc Namblard - French soundscape artist's site. Very naturalistic, good listening (text in French). [WEBSITE] Field Notes, the Gruenrekorder Magazine - The German Gruenrekorder is one of the most active record labels in the global soundscape community, and they've recently begun publishing a bilingual online magazine. The most recent edition includes an interview with the passionate phonographer Walter Tilgner (a key European recordist whose work in the 1980s paralleled that of Gordon Hempton and Bernie Krause in the US), a collection of old Chinese texts regarding silence and noise compiled by sound artist Lin Chi-Wei, and anecdotes by Yannick Dauby regarding his recording and hearing experiences with frogs. [WEBSITE] Wandering Ear - Net label curated by Nathan Larson and Mike Hallenbeck that releasese several new titles each year, all available as free downloads. [WEBSITE] Play 20 Harry Partch Instruments Online - My favorite post ever from the always-entertaining Odd Instruments blog is this one, linking in to an American Public Media site where your keyboard is a trigger, allowing you to play 20 of Partch's wild instruments. [WEBSITE] Sound of the Eiffel Tower - Sound artist China Blue recently published this great account of her day spent recording the metal, wind, and tourists, including links to lots of audio and a couple of videos. [WEBSITE] Kalerne - Website of sound artist Yannick Dauby. Features several thoughtful essays (in English) and many sounds. [WEBSITE] Sonatura - A French audio blog, including essays and field recordings from many recordists. [WEBSITE] Jonny Farrow Site - New York sound artists Jonny Farrow's website, with many audio and video clips. [WEBSITE] Ear to the Earth - This network of sound artists is exploring the interface of sound art and environmetnal awareness, hosting annual symposia and this new website, featuring a modest collection of interesting field recordings, and a nice sound art blog. [WEBSITE] Seattle Phonographers Union - Seattle's ear-minded folk come together with some regularity to share new work, and at times "jam" together, creating improvised performances of their field recordings. This page has excerpts from several events. [WEBPAGE] John Bullitt EarthSoundArt - Creator of the DeepEarthDome, a 3D immersive sound installation that puts the listener inside the earth, as earthquakes and other crustal seismic sounds resonate all around, and the CD EarthSounds, has a wonderfully diverse website that features not only sounds of the earth's interior, but a rich collection of other recordings and reflections. [GO THERE] Specially for Commuters - The first of a planned several online sound journeys into subway systems of the world, beginning with the London Underground. Large Shockwave presentation, takes solid bandwidth. [GO THERE] Marcus Coates' Dawn Chorus - Unlike the rest of these links, this isn't a full-fledged site, but a film clip that is part of a remarkable gallery installation by Marcus Coates. He recorded a dawn chorus of birdsong, then slowed down individual bird calls to a speed and pitch that is in the range of human hearing and singing. He then filmed 17 people imitating the slowed-down songs. Finally, he speeded up these human voice recordings, re-creating the original bird calls in remarkable detail. [WEBPAGE] Neil Horne Music Spaces - A java-based soundscape composition/play environment, in which Horne has put together seven different sets of 20 sounds each: Sky Music (insects), Rock Platform (tidal pools), Urban Music, etc. In any "space," you can trigger any or all of the 20 sound files by clicking on a square of his folk-art grid; sounds toggle off with another click and rolling on. Very fun, though it can be addicting! Horne also has a blog, which includes sound, video, and philosophy. [MUSIC SPACES] [dotAtelier BLOG] Wildsong - Scottish recordist Geoff Sample offers up a generous selection of recordings, along with a large collection of bioacoustics links. [GO THERE] The Big Ear - This project invites site visitors to participate in a global sound journal, in which people share whatever they are hearing in the moment. Largely text-based, with modest audio contributions. [GO THERE] Binaural Media Survey of Location and Context-Based Media - A series of interviews with sound artists, including Chris Watson, Francisco Lopez, and Yannick Dauby [WEBSITE] New Adventures in Sound Art - Toronto-based organization sponsoring events and web resources covering sound installations, radio art, soundwalking, and other sound arts [WEBSITE] Steve Peters Sound Art Blog - Photos, descriptions, and sounds from a wide array of Steve's work. [WEBSITE] SoundAsArt: Blurring the Boundaries - UK conference planned for November 2006. Website includes detailed abstracts of a slew of interesting papers. [WEBSITE] Santa Fe Sound - An ocassional audio journal from Jason Goodyear, a recordist, musician, and audio teacher (as well as AEI's resident web coding guru/savior). [WEBSITE] The Sonic Memorial Project - An incredible Flash-based site that gathers oral histories and personal reflections on the WTC collapse into an online sound art presentation and archive. [WEBSITE] Taiwan Soundscapes - Two blogs from Tsai-Wei Chen, a Taiwanese student at Goldsmiths College, University of London [BLOGSPOT] [BLOGROODO] Windows Sounds Symphony Orchestra - A Flash project that orchestrates Windows alert sounds into a musical piece; you watch multiple audio controllers create the piece. [ARTICLE ABOUT IT] [THE FLASH PRESENTATION] Sound and Society - Travel journal by Paul Roquet, during a Watson Fellowship devoted to exploring the acoustic dimensions of culture in the Cook Islands, Fiji, New Zealand, Australia, Singapore, Malaysia & Canada. [WEBSITE]
The River - An online "show" of new sound works from 11 soundscape artists, curated by EarthEar. Pieces range from concrete to abstract; all can be heard in their entirety as moderate quality streams, or purchased as high-quality MP3s. [WEBSITE] WorldTune - This website is an ongoing interactive soundsource, with speakers in several locations worldwide playing whichever sound samples have been recently chosen by intrepid internet surfers. A sound library includes submissions from around the world, and is being constantly expanded. Surf on over and change the sound of the world! [WEBSITE] Phonography.org - A loose collection of field recordists, with sounds of human habitats having equal billing with nature. [WEBSITE] Quiet American - Web site of Aaron Thieme, a Bay Area producer. Features "One Minute Vacations", updated weekly. [WEBSITE] Echo-Locator - A roving community catalyst project that creates live radio and performances inspired by the unique soundscapes of individual communities. [WEBSITE] Sound References in Literature - A World Soundscape Project collection of great quotes relating to sound and listening. [WEBSITE] Silophone - Canadian grain silo turned sound art resonating chamber. Anyone can submit sounds to the online archive (ten thousand files so far), and site visitors trigger these files to be played into the silo and re-broadcast online. [WEBSITE] [HEAR NPR STORY] Soundwalks Online - A collection of online soundwalks hosted by Andra McCartney. [WEBSITE] Related: Andra McCartney's personal site [WEBSITE] Sounding Places with Hildegard Westerkamp - Online monograph by Andra McCartney. [WEBSITE] Chris DeLaurenti - Seattle-based writer and recordist; site features essays and sound pieces relating to his "aural safaris". [WEBSITE] Audio Hyperspace Radio Art Online - A monthly collection of interesting radio art pieces presented online by German producer Sabine Breitsameter [WEBSITE] Interspecies Communication - For the past 25 years, Jim Nollman has been using improvised music as a doorway to communication with orcas, dolphins, belugas, turkeys, monkeys, and his fellow humans. [WEBSITE] Australian Sound Design Project - Consortium of Aussie sound artists. [WEBSITE] London Musicians Collective - A great revolving collection of live streams and archived presentations. [WEBSITE] Lost and Found Sound - Archives of a year-long NPR series, each one exploring personal experiences of sound. [WEBSITE] Swarm Music - Tim Blackwell's site, on which he offers up a digitized model of music based on swarming and flocking relationships as seen in insects or birds. [WEBSITE] Audio Recordings of Great Works of Art - This is an odd site that gets stellar marks for both concept and execution. Hear recordings made in galleries, in front of masterpieces of the art world. Includes the Mona Lisa, The Kiss, Tower of Babel, Van Gogh's Self Portrait with Hat, Venus de Millo, and more. [WEBSITE] Soundscape Editions - Online collection of a wide variety of field recording based compositions, in a blog format that includes images, good descriptions of the location, and extended recordings. [WEBSITE]
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