Today, 18 July, is the birthday of the Canadian composer R. Murray Schafer, who was pivotal in expanding our understanding of the soundscape in all its forms. As such, today is World Listening Day, in honour of which I present for you one simple sound from my daily life. I've added this to a new album on last.fm. Go directly to Remnants and have a listen! Can you tell what it is? (Answers in the comments.)Since Schafer published his book Soundscape: Our Sonic Environment and the Tuning of the World a new awareness of sound ecology has developed. Today there are many individuals and organisations around the world dedicated to the "simple" act of listening, among them the World Soundscape Project and the World Forum for Acoustic Ecology. Thousands of sound artists and phonographers, like myself, work to encourage active listening in a world dominated by the visual.
World Listening Day was designed "to celebrate the practice of listening as it relates to the world around us, environmental awareness, and acoustic ecology".
Today, do yourself a favour. Listen closely to something you have never bothered attending to before.
And if you have not read Schafer's book, buy it from Amazon through the following links. You will support this site and my ongoing sound work.
Or, start with those links and buy anything else from Amazon. You pay the same, but a portion of Amazon's profits instead go to help this site. Thank you!
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