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A LIFE IN SOUND
This series aims to take listeners on an epic and intimate journey through the natural world, all through the medium of sound and at the same time we want to enable a rare glimpse into the life of a man who recorded everything you’re about to hear, one sound at a time.
Martyn Stewart has spent his lifetime on a mission: to record the natural sounds of our planet. It’s a story that will take us from a council estate in Birmingham England and ultimately take him to every corner of the planet. From Belize to the Arctic Wildlife Refuge, from Denali to the Galapagos, to some of the most inhospitable locations geographically and politically. He will be attacked by lions and crocodiles, arrested in Japan for filming the annual dolphin slaughter and then find himself in long periods of isolation, in remote corners of the world waiting for 30 seconds of a that perfect sound. This is ultimately a love story – dedicated to our natural world and to the people who spend their lives aiming to give it a voice.
A LIFE IN SOUND
Creative Conversations with Louis VI
Join us for another A Life in Sound special with Martyn Stewart and Rapper, DJ, Zoologist, Musician, Presenter| Reconnecting diaspora to 🌿| BBC Creator in Residence NHU | Musician Louis VI.
Together, Louis and Martyn worked on his track Orange Skies as part of the United Nations Live 'Sounds Right' initiative where Nature was officially launched as an artist, Earth Day 2024. https://open.spotify.com/track/5g2SGvTGdCwTtu37KJskwr
Join them in conversation at they journey through the fascinating world of natural soundscapes, the fragile beauty of endangered species and how this all informs Louis' music. We kick things off with a remarkable story about capturing the elusive calls of the mountain chicken frog, and we explore the unexpected joys and challenges of field recording. Discover the irreplaceable value of audio archives housing over 100,000 files, each one a sonic treasure from a rapidly changing world.
Sound is a powerful barometer of our planet's health, and this episode underscores the deep emotional connections we have with natural audio. We reveal how modern life has created a disconnect between society and nature, emphasizing the importance of reintroducing these sounds to younger generations. Dive into the unique intersection of music and nature, where genres like hip-hop and rap are used as tools to raise awareness about climate change and biodiversity loss, conveying powerful messages that resonate on a personal level.
As we immerse ourselves in the meticulous process of capturing untouched natural sounds, you'll gain insights into the impacts of human activities such as noise pollution on animal communication. From ants to elephants, we discuss the innovative efforts to bridge interspecies communication, featuring projects like Project SETI. Reflect on the meditative experience of field recording and the stories these sounds tell about environmental destruction, from deforestation to forest fires. By the end of this episode, you'll come away with a renewed appreciation for the beauty of natural soundscapes and our collective responsibility to protect them.
www.thelisteningplanet.com
This is Martin Stewart with A Life in Sound from the Listening Planet, in partnership with Biophonica Beats.
Louis VI:I've been listening through these sounds non-stop. I really I cannot believe you've got a mountain chicken. Sound from Dominico.
Martyn Stewart:And I never went out to get one.
Louis VI:Yeah.
Martyn Stewart:You know it was just there. I never went out to get one. Yeah, you know, it was just there. And the funny thing is is when you, when you travel around places and you stick microphones out, you never expect you know to get certain things. If you're doing species specific, like hanging around with a parabola dish and and you're focusing on birds or animals or insects or toads and frogs, then okay, you kind of feel you're going to get something like that. But when, when I recorded that I was talking to a biologist and he was saying how scarce they were and that that blows my mind. You know that something can be fragile in this day and age it's just the story of everything you, you see and record and meet.
Martyn Stewart:These days, you know, everything's on the precipice of either being endangered or extinct, yeah. So when, when you asked for that, I went through my library and I thought, oh god, yeah, I've got one, because you, it's 90, there's 97 000 files, wow. And this project has made me revisit so many stuff. You know someone will come along and say do you? You have something of Norway? And I'm going through Norway yesterday and thinking how the fuck did I miss that? You?
Louis VI:know, there's.
Martyn Stewart:there's lots of different things, so you introduced me back to the chicken frog again and that's, and that will possibly be one of these critters that is on the extinct list.
Louis VI:Yeah, I mean it really. So it's on my dad's side, that's from dominica and it's a really um, uh, it's mad because the first time I went there they weren't really that endangered. Um, I didn't get to see one, but they were kind of. You know, they weren't, they were still on the menu. Now you can't eat them, but they were called mountain chicken because people used to eat them like frog's legs and it's just this gigantic frog, as you know. But I think there's one population on another nearby island, so there's a bit of hope for them. So they're like trying to breathe them back. And they're not. They still exist there deep, deep in the forest. Um, did you? Did you just see it and just think, oh, I'll point never saw it, just recorded it.
Martyn Stewart:that that was it, and I isolated it, took away all the critter, the insect sounds. You suddenly come across things that you took for granted years ago and then you've you've found that you couldn't kind of go back and replicate that anymore because things have changed so much. Right, so 97,000 files, probably 100,000 files now, with over 30,000 hours of natural sound and God knows how many species. I keep saying 3,500 species of birds, but I'm sure it's about 4,000. It's hard to put a number to it, but I started recording stuff when I was 11.
Martyn Stewart:Wow, and I never, ever thought animals, critters, would become extinct I always thought it was down to the dinosaur or the dodo or you know, the irish elk. I thought that's that's that held that mantle. It's my library is that two-thirds extinct because you can't go back and record that stuff?
Louis VI:yeah, it's, and it's so weird because, yeah, it's so competing, like I'm in, I'm in london now and it's when I hear bird song in the morning. It's a it's that you know, it's a significant thing to be able to hear bird song over the sound of everything else. It's quite nuts, um, and it's yeah, gosh, it must be such, it must be just such. You know, the animal kingdom must be just thinking, oh, for fuck's sake, let us that for a few minutes. Um, and it's, it's also. It's like what, what are? There's so much sound. I'm so, I'm so convinced we're like, especially in these cityscapes where it's there's such human dominated sound, I'm, I'm convinced that we're subjecting ourselves to this, um, like evolutionary stress. We're supposed to be hearing natural sounds evolutionary stress.
Louis VI:I like that yeah, we're supposed to be hearing these sounds of nature. The bird sounds everything as a sign that all is well. Basically, and you know, when things go really quiet in nature it tends to mean something is wrong. It means that we've got this, like you know, subconscious evolutionary stress of being predated in when we're in cities and not hearing birdsong or any of the nature sounds or amphibians or frogs or the full spectrum that you get in a really biodiverse place and it's terrifying how much we're losing a bit and it's amazing you've heard so much. I mean, honestly, I've got the list in front of me here. There's ones that are just so incredible and mad, like the frigate bird, like I've never heard it make that second sound. Um, it's quite a sci-fi sounding, but some cool sounds.
Martyn Stewart:You know, I I go and find where they are, where they're hanging out, um, how they nest what roost in places. Going back to what I was saying about the chicken frog, um 1990 was when I recorded that.
Louis VI:No way.
Martyn Stewart:That was with analog. So there was. I think I was using my Niagara 4 and Niagara 5 at the time with that, so when I recorded it there was no way of separation. You couldn't do what you do now digitally. You can't go in and paint out frequencies and you know, replace stuff, and thank god, you know there's software where I can enhance everything. I did, you know, 1974, 1975. So so today's technology, I can isolate those sounds. Now, if you, if you ask me for something, 20 years ago I wouldn't have been able to do it. But you know, technology is such that it's like photoshop for sound. You, you can go in and just eradicate all these unwanted sounds what?
Louis VI:what I'm interested in as well is like how so are you going and recording, like safer, when you're going to this swamp with this incredible name? I can't remember the name, but it's um. What was the name of this one that you're going to tomorrow? Okie finokie okie finokie swamp sounds like something out of like a dr zeus book the last time I was up there was um 2005.
Martyn Stewart:Wow, and it was. It was march of 2005. So I can go up to the around those areas and record and then compare the two of them. So what's that? My maths are shit. That's 20 years ago, right, nearly 19 years ago. But the change would be in 19 years and see what what's happening, and a lot of it is man-made interference and a lot of it is climate change as well. Time I walk the dog in the mornings there's a little bit of habitat where it's about a two mile round loop and it's all old florida palm and ferns and oak. It's quite beautiful really, but this, this year and last year I would say there's probably 40 percent less species that that dwell in those places. Audio is kind of like that. Audio is the barometer of the health of the planet.
Louis VI:Always, always, believe that you know uh, yeah, I really believe that too. If you I guess it's like you you notice it first. Um, and that's that's the weird thing as well is, like, I think I think the reason I'm excited about all this stuff that we've got to do and, you know, doing this, this remix as well is, I do feel, like the thing with image and the thing with, like pictures and video is it's all amazing and beautiful and we're very visual creatures, but, um, sound is the one thing that really, like sounds is the thing that can make you cry or or feel any emotion when you watch film or, like I always say, I hate horror films and if you turn off the sound, it's it's hard for you know, we there's a disconnect.
Martyn Stewart:That's happened, it seems like over 10 years. We've disconnected from nature. We've gone more. We're always a visual species, as you say. We're always that way. But these projects that we set up with artists like you, to me it's like a doorway opening up and saying let's reintroduce or not reintroduce, because a lot of people have never been introduced in the first place. But let me introduce you into this beautiful world, and we don't have to paint a picture, just show it. So I'm really happy that you've grabbed the baton and looked at something, because obviously it's embedded in you your ancestry, your history, your connections with the motherland. It can only be a good thing, right, yeah?
Louis VI:I hope so. I mean, god, thank you, man, I'm very humbled that you listened and humbled that there was some stuff that spoke to you. I mean I do. Yeah, I agree in the sense. There's so much to talk about in the world and I've always been such a nature geek and it was funny because it took my sister going oh, for fuck's sake, you need to just be your fullest, geekiest self in the music as well and just combine both of them. Um, like just before and during covid, for me to really lean into it. But um, yeah, that's that's.
Louis VI:You know, I'm really humbled by your words and I think I do think there's some, there's something really powerful and profound to play, like, I think, you know, with climate change and biodiversity loss. It is a communications thing and I think a lot of the communications have lacked creativity and being like well, and I think this is the. This is a really interesting space. We've got the sound of this planet and it's funny that you say you don't listen to much music because I, if I'm in nature, I'm the first person to say please turn off your speaker, or like. So I just I'm like the part of the being in nature is the sound for you it must.
Louis VI:It's obviously basically the whole deal and it's if you can combine that, I think, with music somehow and you know, this is the thing that I've got to work at, work out and I'm trying to work out is is combining music in a way where you don't I don't want to change the nature sounds too much, because that's the beauty of it, that's its own music.
Louis VI:We'll put it in a place and and try and tell a story that brings in one people that have never been spoken to about this stuff, like you're saying, young people who are disconnected, if they've even been connected. We have a deep emotional response to the sound of this planet because it's, you know, it's part of us and I think, um, if there's a way we can make that get out into music, that's something that billions of people digest on the planet, and I think the thing that's special about hip-hop is it's always been and and rap, and, and the poetry of it is it's always been a way of shedding light or interpreting something, um, using yeah, using music, but also using words and poetry.
Martyn Stewart:I think you can tap into something now that's totally unique in this genre.
Louis VI:Yeah.
Martyn Stewart:You're an educated lad too, and you're connected with nature, and I can see the love in you as well, you know. That can only give me hope.
Louis VI:Yeah.
Martyn Stewart:And there's a duty that I've always stated. I always use this phrase my rent for being on the planet is to speak up for the animals. That's the cost of everything and it has to be that way. However, we're suffering, they still haven't got a voice and finding a way of them talking through music, through different genres, through poetry, through whatever has to be. It just has to be, and you can't love what you don't understand. You can't protect what you don't understand, protect what you don't understand. You've got to, you've got to find a way of loving something like that. I mean, for me, beauty is in in the eyes of the beholder. I I find ants to elephants the most beautiful thing, and they all have something to offer and this beautiful cycle of life that that we've disrupted. There has to be something that's got to change quite dramatically at the moment. But there's a lot of, a lot of species that from there that we can start chucking a whole lot of stuff. Even ocean sounds that you know in.
Martyn Stewart:Yeah, you've got fabulous waters around there yeah you get a hydrophone and you drop it in. I've got a 50 foot cable and I drop it in lots of places like um, coral reef and lots of cetaceans, lots of fish sounds, a lot of stuff under the beach itself. You know, dig a hole and drop a hydrophone in and listen to the water come over the top. It's just some crazy sounds, some amazing stuff. I can start filling up a box, you know. I know you you ask for specific sounds, but I can start giving you some other stuff to to knock your creative juices going is I want to.
Louis VI:I want to hear all the. I mean, god, I've got so many things to say, but the I want to hear all the. The weirder less requested sounds, for sure I want to hear all of that.
Martyn Stewart:There's some wonderful things, and I'm sure you'll turn them into even better things.
Louis VI:Yeah, I just, I feel like, yeah, I just think this, it's so amazing what you've done and got just so many amazing sounds and masses. I could just I could have lived quite a happy life, I think, just listening through everything you've got.
Martyn Stewart:Bless you, bless you, man.
Louis VI:Yeah, I mean even God the nightjar. You got here the orangutan. I had no idea they sounded like that.
Martyn Stewart:I've not had the. Well, listen to things like the injury and some, some amazing places around the world. I loved it in papua new guinea. I loved it in borneo. I loved it in indonesia polynesia.
Louis VI:I was so lucky to go to places kind of coming back to sound the thing and culture. We're talking about, how sound and culture is hopefully going to be the thing that persuades us as humans, but it's like the thing that we're losing, that it's almost the saddest part, because we've barely started to scratch the surface of it is the sound and cultures of these species. Like I'm always thinking about what you know, we haven't even had an interspecies conversation properly yet. It's like what cultures and and music and sounds are we losing from species that we don't even know yet and don't even understand? Like I've recorded some sperm whales, um clicking in dominica because it's just there's so many of them and it's that's a beautiful, hopeful story because they just made the first ever sperm whale marine park there.
Louis VI:But the guy was saying they have the biggest um language center of any animal in the world and they already got huge brains and they speak in an environment where sound as you will know, sound way better than me, but sound travels so well in the medium of water, so they're having a conversation like we're having, um, but at distances that are spanning miles, but it's like they're in the same and able to use that medium and they've been around for so much longer than us, for literally like millions of years. They've had all that time to develop language. They're having some crazy conversations and we haven't even tried. We're not even chatting to them. There's the project for Project SETI, where they're trying to use AI to talk with them and they're getting quite close and it's getting to the point like, what do we say? But it might be to the point that they're so advanced. You know, this is the thing it's like. Put it into human terms, it's like we think we're the most intelligent species because we've built all this.
Martyn Stewart:Maybe that's the highest sign of the animals have had to change the way they communicate with each other because of us as well you know, bird species have had to change their frequencies to be heard to carry on breeding yeah there's so many examples of that.
Martyn Stewart:You think, if, if a black-capped chickadee lives on the mainland in mid-usa, why does it sound differently on martha's vineyard, for instance? And you look at it and you think, well, there's a. It's a few decibels higher than the other guy. Why is that? And then, when you start looking at the background of there, and there's, there's, uh, man-made noises which follow that same frequency, and the bird has had to change the way it communicates to be heard. So many examples of that throughout the world.
Martyn Stewart:Things have changed, frequencies have changed by animals. They know how to do, we just don't know how to to listen. Yeah, talk and we can talk and we can do everything we want, but we don't listen. We experience things, but we have the attention span of a gnat. We need so much things to keep our existence pure for ourselves and stimulate our minds, but nature has been doing this for a time. On a memorial, you know that nature shows us how, how we live, how we, how we live side by side with each other, how a squirrel is never going to complain that a rabbit's under its tree and a frog's never going to bother about a, a bee that's pollinating it. But we have problems with something coming into our territories and we destroy what we don't understand. And we have to start understanding very quickly, because what we have left I they have to be protected, just has to be. It's their earth too yeah, that just.
Louis VI:There's a fascination that could be triggered and I think sound is such a quick way to like, bypass all the information and all the other usual roadblocks and get straight to the, to the core of it, which is the feeling of being in nature. Like you could put on all the vr goggles as well, like and immerse yourself in a natural space, but without the actual sound and the smell and the actual feeling of it. It's just, it's not the same um sanitized.
Louis VI:Yeah, yeah sure where, where I got a question who made me think where have you recorded that you found has stayed? Is there any way you've recorded that stayed like sounding very natural.
Martyn Stewart:Wow, yeah, wow, maybe places like the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, because the population up there still is minimal. I mean, there are native villages like which have a small population, but you can't put a road through the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and there's millions of acres of wilderness. But I've been up there five times, on the coastal plain, on the brook side of the mountain in Sunset Pass, along the Congucut River, and one particular time when they dropped me out on a bush plane and had all my recording gear and food and I was amongst the tundra and bears and musk, oxen and arctic fox and a million species of birds, it seemed. But the closest, I think, to wilderness has to be up in Alaska.
Louis VI:Wow, okay. Closest, I think, to wilderness is has to be up in alaska. Wow, okay. And what does your date like? What is what is like a recording session look like for you? Is it? Are you going off for for weeks like this on your own and just hitting record?
Martyn Stewart:I talk a lot to myself, I do a lot of talking. I I set out a protocol that I think if I can do the dawns and then middays and then evening choruses, they're kind of go hand in hand and you can compare against each other like that. And I set my protocol the same. I configure every single microphone the same. I configure the recording equipment the same, because you can't adjust levels and say that's going to be science later on. You've got to have something that's consistent.
Martyn Stewart:So I will record for an hour in the morning and an hour in midday, and then evening I'll do an hour. Or, you know, just sit there on my seat for a couple of three hours with headphones on, writing down what I hear, and I'm not expecting anything different, it's just soundscape and it's the greatest form of meditation you could ever. You know if, if you're sitting there and you're just listening to, there's no such thing as quiet, but it's that tranquil space that you're allowed to walk into. And um, that's when I used to have the problems. If you hear the plane coming in, god, I wouldn't turn that off until the plane went. I kept it going because obviously it's. It's science, scientific data. There's flight paths going on. Is that flight path being present over the last five years? Is it this that so many questions and they also sound is also used for impact statements as well.
Martyn Stewart:You know environmental impact statements yeah but the protocol has to be the same way and and I've recorded that way since I was 19, I've kept that kind. The levels are always. If it's quiet, the levels are still the same. I make sure I put a an audible tone at the beginning of it so that if I did change the gain on a recording I could reference the 30 db tone, go back to that to have it back to its present state wow so I'm pretty disciplined when it goes out.
Martyn Stewart:When I'm doing species specific stuff, I'm walking around with a parabola dish and a good mate of mine in sweden, who built these uh to linger dishes, made my life a lot better than walking around with a squirrel baffler with a metal dish and every insect is. It was like a dinner bell going off, bing, you know, and then you're walking through woods and forests and you're getting bangs and things and stuff on on the dish. So he created this, this uh polythene dish which you could fold up and stick it in the plane and just fly off, unroll it and then record stuff. Those are cool times and if you ask me what's my favorite recording, I always state the last one I did, because it's just impossible to say which was your best one. It's like saying if you go to a desert island, what's your five albums you're going to take with you and you think just five. Come on, you can't do it.
Louis VI:It's interesting to know what to do. I'm going to have a play. I was quite interested to know about the Forest Palm Oil Fires MP3 that you sent. Palm oil fires MP3 that you sent. Is that the same place, moving from what sounds like very nature, pristine habitat, to logging to then fire, or was it the soundscape you created? It sounded amazing.
Martyn Stewart:I created that soundscape based on actual audio. So the first time I went to Kantanaman Canyon in Borneo, you've got this fantastic river that just glides through the forest and then in the morning you hear the gibbons and the animals chorusing and then that definite chainsaw sound, which some of the saddest sounds you can ever hear.
Louis VI:It's just the of of their beautiful home I was wondering how there's like there was a few minds when. When ginny, there's a few thoughts in my mind when ginny originally asked me and I was like how do I do this orange guys thing? Because obviously, from the name orange guys, I'm talking about forest fires, both ones that have happened naturally but too much due to climate change, and ones that have been set off purposely, and ones that have been happened to, like clear forest, like even in amazon or borneo, and like how to best tell that story? Like is it that we like? I really like this soundscape?
Louis VI:This could be that soundscape could move throughout the length of the track where it starts, uh, pristine, and it ends by burning, um, it could also be like start where, yeah, it's at the beginning, sounds rich and it's got all these different, um, animals that you've sent that all live in in various different forest habitats, whether that's together or put into, sectioned off into different ecosystems or parts of the world, and then we move into more. Just, silence could be an interesting way to do it as well I think that would be such a powerful message.
Martyn Stewart:I message. With that I mean your words. Behind all that stuff, you're telling the story and, yeah, you, you could talk about borneo. You could talk about the rainforest amazonia. You could talk about how columbia is being taken apart. You could talk about most parts of africa. You could talk about the boreal forest. The boreal forests are the most important forests above the amazonian rainforest and that's been deforested something like 80 percent. They've lost 80% of the boreal forest around Northern hemisphere. I think that I think that that's a powerful message.
Martyn Stewart:It's almost like what was that? You'd be 40 track. They did, and the title was, so you know, dramatic the earth lies screaming, dies screaming, was that it? And she's, she's doing that all the time, you know yeah it's those silent screams. So when you, when you're talking about logging and burning forests and taking trees away and then left with that silence, those are silent screams yeah, but I think if, how do we get this into into a song?
Louis VI:because it's I've got, uh, another friend of mine's gonna feature on it. He's a big artist and I'm gonna like his verse will be the new verse added on the end and he's super smart as well. Mick jenkins, who's a massive rapper in the us, already smashed it with his verse. Um, and I, you know, I'm not almost like, do I could use some parts of it literally within, maybe as a percussive thing or in the melody, experiment with that, but it could be quite amazing to have it, as you know, you're describing as this orchestra, with parts literally being chopped out and then all burnt out even, could be a good way of doing it. There's something, especially as the tracks, called orange skies and yeah, there's the weirdly beautiful but horrific sign of orange skies and what it actually means.
Louis VI:Um, and all the fires around the world. I really like the idea with the borneo or the boreal and it changing from sounding, yeah, healthy to cut down and coming less and less and maybe ending with the fire or the sound of it, and then even the sound of it burnt and how quiet it is could be really powerful for that specific track and I mean it's asking a lot. I think any Borneo or the borough forest would be incredible, but it could be an interesting one to link it. If you I don't know if you had anything of like. Um, I don't know if there's anything in the madagascan forest, I know it's happening a lot there as well yes, I've recorded in madagascar really yes.
Louis VI:So I think that, if anything you way, we could create that soundscape for it being um, sounding pristine to them, dipping, maybe being burnt out on fire, to then silent what kind of duration are you looking at?
Martyn Stewart:Would you rather have a stem of fire, a stem of beauty? You know everything going off, cacophony of sounds, a stem with logging, a stem of silence? Or do you want me to mix that to you?
Louis VI:Maybe that's the best way, but it could be quite interesting. It could be quite interesting hearing your take on the mix I'll do.
Martyn Stewart:I'll do a mix then.
Louis VI:Yeah, I'll do a mix of three different places and see what you think yeah, I think that'd be really cool and I think and it might be, I don't know it might be more fun. It's kind of a bit more creative on your side as well I would love to do that.
Martyn Stewart:I love that title too orange guys yeah, just say so much I'll change.
Louis VI:I'm going to change the productions a little bit, um, maybe even a lot, depending on on the soundscape. I mean, it would be amazing. I want to give as much room to the nature as I can, whilst keeping it feeling like a song, which is going to be an interesting experiment. I think, um, I'm definitely biased towards the nature sounds.
Martyn Stewart:That's cool, that's absolutely cool.
Louis VI:Well, I'll work on that. That'd be ideal, god, I can't wait to hear it. But this Borneo one what I'm going to do, if it's all right with you, I'm going to drop that into the current track and have a play to see how that movement sounds. Of course, that um and then and then, yeah, send me whatever you come up with.
Martyn Stewart:Louis, you're an amazing bloke.
Louis VI:So are you man? Bloody hell, it's an absolute honour to meet you, man. I mean, I knew we were going to get on from uh, from listening to your recordings and stuff. You're a bit of a bloody legend, man legend my arse.
Martyn Stewart:God bless you.
Louis VI:I think you are. I think nature would be pretty. Mother nature would be pretty, certainly calling you a legend for how much you've recorded her sounds, man well, if she calls me that, I'll accept it yeah you've just experienced another journey on the listening planet podcast.
Martyn Stewart:Dive deeper into the world of natural sounds by connecting with us online. Visit our website or follow us on social media. Let the symphony of nature surround you wherever you go. Happy listening.
