Cities And Memory

"Decided to give the inspiring piece some ambience without being too invasive." Waorani dance from Ecuador reimagined by Elaine Silva.

"Processed using the MakeNoise Tape and Microsound Machine. The work abstracts the sounds of the olive press while retaining its original acoustic character and suggestion of utility — transforming obsolete machinery into a resonant source of sonic potential, an acoustic residue."  Abandoned olive press in Benfeita, Portugal reimagined by Alan Cook.

"A team of 18 sled dogs at the Sisimiut observatory station in Greenland howls in a rising and falling chorus at feeding time. While a human can typically hear high-frequency sounds up to 20,000 Hz, dogs can hear up to 60,000 Hz or above and are highly attuned to pitch differences as small as 1/8 tone. Here the dogs' cries are slowed down and lowered in pitch, revealing melodies that appear to be ultrasonic frequencies not normally audible to the human ear.  "A woman's voice is encoded on a 2.5" micro-floppy disk drive and triggered by a 1980s 12-bit sampler, double-tracked by a metallophone and raised in pitch, glissing upward toward the dogs' high-frequency hearing range. In combination, the hungry dogs' cries and the singing woman's voice each take on some of the other's acoustic morphology. The rising tones of the singing woman cross and merge with the falling pitches of the howling dogs, which are further lowered and slowed down until they produce quasi-linguistic sounding utterances. "The sled dogs si

"I liked the sound of the crows, you hear them everywhere. I manipulated the original sound and improvised over it and then reworked the whole. By accident the sound became like a pulse which created a tension. I just followed that impulse." Crows in Sapporo, Japan reimagined by Patrick Bridge.

"The original sound file is the core of the piece, having taken shorter bits of the  audio and collaged them with audio from synthesizers to form the whole. Hardware used was Apple Mac MINI, Roland Seaboard M; Software used was Logic, Audacity, and Equator II. "The piece evolved from the environmental non-human sounds in the original recording." Fajr call to prayer in Tunis reimagined by Dennis Moser.

"I really liked the 'ka-chunk' sounds the ski lift makes as it goes over the uneven parts in the wires, kind of like the sounds trains make going over certain parts of the rails. I pulled one of these sounds out and built it into a longer, compound sound, then used it as one of the beats throughout the piece.  "I also used a lower-volume version of the entire long sample from Seceda Mountain, capturing occasional ski lift noises, but more, the air in the mountains — you can barely hear the air, but you can easily imagine that crisp, snowy, high-altitude feeling, so perhaps it comes though subconsciously!  "Otherwise, the other sounds were created with guitars and midi instruments, with a big influence of shoegaze and 80-90s shimmery etherial music."  Ortisei ski lift reimagined by Annie Smidt.

"The field recording I worked with was of an everyday moment; the beeps and clicks of a traffic light, and as soon as I heard it I was singing along, exploring the sounds - it took me away to a place of implied melodies, textures and rhythms - much like incidental sounds sometimes do that in 'real life', whether it's birdsong, a snatch of a melody or the hum of jet engines. It's all inspiration and invitation." Tallinn pedestrian crossing reimagined by de Velden.

The distinctive ticking of a pedestrian crossing on a busy road in Tallinn, which gets quicker to let you know it's time to cross, and slower when it's time to wait.  Recorded in September 2024 by Cities and Memory. 

This recording was taken while ascending on a chair ski lift. The mountain is sparse, empty and still with no wind. The only sound is the machinery and distant voices of a few skiers. This was my first trip abroad in 2022 since the COVID-19 pandemic had struck the world. Recorded in Ortisei, Italy by Antek Rutczynski.

 I developed my composition from the gentle hubbub of people inside the echoey library of one of the world’s great universities: the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM)— the National Autonomous University of Mexico. In July 2007, UNESCO proclaimed the UNAM Central Library, along with the UNAM Campus as World Heritage sites. The recording was created by Mexican sound recordist par excellence Erick Ruiz Arrellano.  This simple spatial human reverberance at UNAM generated multiple sound memories for me, with intersecting  connections. The key connection is between my research on 1920s nationalism and the high energy Dance of the Old Men, from the P’urhépecha peoples of Michoacán; and Mexico’s current presidenta, Dr. Claudia Scheinbaum Pardo, who studied at, and was then a professor at UNAM, working on energy and climate change. For her undergraduate thesis she spent time in the P’urhépecha region working on energy and stoves.  My composition juxtaposes and interweaves various sonic fragments and thr

Library at UNAM. Stereo 48kHz 24bit. Recorded in Mexico City by Erick Ruiz Arellano.

A classic soundscape of Oban harbour, starting with serving up langoustines, crabs and mussels in the seafood shack, a walk along the harbour wall and then a huge ferry slowly arrives.  Towards the end of the recording, the throbbing drone of the engines blends with the creak of massive mooring ropes straining against the ferry's capstans.  Recorded in April 2025 in Oban, Scotland by Cities and Memory. 

A couple with acoustic guitars entertain themselves - and all the passers-by - singing and playing folk songs underneath the lighthouse in Bremerhaven. Recorded in Bremerhaven, Germany in May 2025 by Cities and Memory. 

It's early October 2020, the Australian springtime is in full swing. We are at a beautiful large property in the Tweed Valley, owned by members of our family. Down the hill from the residence, there is a dammed creek bordered on the opposite bank by dense trees of the National Park. It's just getting dark at 6.30pm.  Down at the dam the soundscape is alive with a background of cicadas. Closer in, Tree frogs and other species are calling. The air is humid and mosquitoes will descend on any exposed flesh. Recorded in Stokers Siding, Australia by Martin Franklin.

"After listening to the sample, we started working on it isolating the voice, guitar, and other ambient sounds. By manipulating these elements, we created the main synths and textures that form the piece. We instinctively imagined a story centred around an unknown civilisation, witnessing a mysterious ritual, after having created the first synth sound, which you can hear at the very beginning. "One should picture being aboard a ship with a life of its own, its breathing perceptible through the textures of the composition. The ship is docked on the coast near the lighthouse where the original recording was captured, in an alternate version of Germany, different from the one we know.* "A man and his followers are in the midst of a ritual, which is followed by the crafting of a mysterious object and the awakening of an entity at the end of the piece. We sense euphoric people moving through the space, expressing themselves with laughter and various vocalizations. The chorus of followers responds to the one lead

"Since this project is based on the experience of landscapes and memory, starting this immediately intrigued me; while searching through the archive of sound recordings I found one recorded in Oban, Scotland.  "I had a memorable visit there once before in summer 1998, and this recording brought back that day in the city, the harbor and the ferry to the islands we visited. The feeling of the place (both in memory and the immediacy of the recording) suggested an approach that keeps the original recording largely intact, while bringing my own experience into confluence with it." Oban harbour, Scotland reimagined by Toby Kaufmann-Buhler.

"I listened to the naturescape a few times before becoming inspired to add some instrumentation. Improvising chord progressions at different tempos allowed me to balance between harmony and animal sounds to have their own space.  "I collaborated with a long, dear friend of mine who has grown into an excellent producer. We had gone back and forth with our ideas for this track and are proud of what we made. Big thanks to Stuart for putting this project together." Stokers Siding, Australia reimagined by Bruhemian & Hellcat Sneer.

Being in Shanghai was strange and beautiful — a blend of wonder and solitude. The culture felt distant, not unfriendly, but quiet in a way I hadn’t expected. In the depths of the metro, people moved like rivers — flowing, efficient, barely speaking.  Unlike the crowded noise of European subways, here the sounds were hushed: soft footsteps, the occasional laugh, or a whisper passing between friends. Most were silent, eyes down, voices lost to screens. And yet, I found comfort in the station announcements — their calm rhythm, their clarity. A kind of mechanical poetry that grounded me in the flow of an unfamiliar city. Recorded by Rafael Diogo.

"Melodic ambient soundscape, underlined with the voices from the station. Floating pads, atmospheric aesthetics.Esoteric dialogue for a deep diving and emotional layers of kindness." Shanghai metro reimagined by John Ov3rblast.

"A lot of my current work includes text so I was drawn towards this recording of a sound installation of people talking. I edited the original audio so that most of the sound between the speaking was removed. I then put that file through the software that I developed for an earlier work that chops the original audio up into smaller sections and plays those sections back at random times, volumes and positions in the stereo field.  "I have then processed the final recording to make it sound more like a surveillance recording through a small speaker and added a drone that runs through the piece."  Bowler hat exhibit at Blenheim Palace reimagined by Simon Belshaw.