Dr. Bernie Krause, one of the world's leading bioacoustic recorders, has
a new book titled /The Great Animal Orchestra./ Once he was with the
group, /The Weavers/, as a composer. When he began collecting
accompaniment from the natural world he got hooked, and together with
collaborator Paul Beaver, took a new path into the splendour of quiet
sounds.
This morning on CBC Radio One, he was discussing his 40 year passion for
archiving the natural world's geological and biological sounds. He said
that when he first began recording, about 45% of the old growth forests
were still here. Today we have 2% remaining.
One recording they featured was of wolves in full orchestral glory. He
says ants sing, even viruses sing. He's certain that originally we
mimicked animals for sound, song and dance. He has observed the sad
lacking in recordings of logged and clear-cut areas, compared with the
rich and diverse sounds within selectively logged or old growth forests.
Animals need to find a particular bandwidth to fully, effectively
express themselves. As these zones are removed or diminished, the songs
and sounds of life within them die off. It parallels with many of our
youths unable to express their natural habits/gifts, and what happens to
them psychologically as well as physically.
We best act to hang on to what we have left. Most significant would be
the loss of our original natural world, of course. But as well, people
may believe we would never lose the music and dance within us, but
humans need teachers for most things. As we steer our children away from
the arts and the great outdoors, can we forever presume to retain the
richness of the original songs and dances? The wolves singing in
Algonquin would strongly suggest otherwise.
Natalia
http://www.cbc.ca/thecurrent/popupaudio.html?clipIds=2235494489
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uWkMWDSVZuQ (a singing tree recording)
http://fora.tv/2009/09/22/Dr_Bernie_Krause_The_Great_Animal_Orchestra
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