Cities And Memory

Svetitskhoveli Cathedral is an Orthodox Christian cathedral located in Georgia's oldest city and former capital, Mtskheta. As I passed through the main entrance and walked through the internal grounds, bell ringers began ringing the bells from high up in one of the towers.  UNESCO listing: Historical Monuments of Mtskheta Recorded by Colin Hunter. ——————— This sound is part of the Sonic Heritage project, exploring the sounds of the world’s most famous sights. Find out more and explore the whole project: https://www.citiesandmemory.com/heritage

Religious procession in Lima. Stereo 48kHz 24bit. UNESCO listing: Historic Centre of Lima Recorded by Erick Ruiz Arellano. ——————— This sound is part of the Sonic Heritage project, exploring the sounds of the world’s most famous sights. Find out more and explore the whole project: https://www.citiesandmemory.com/heritage

Binaural recording of a walk around the mosque, November 2015. UNESCO listing: Historic Areas of Istanbul Recorded by David Webb. ——————— This sound is part of the Sonic Heritage project, exploring the sounds of the world’s most famous sights. Find out more and explore the whole project: https://www.citiesandmemory.com/heritage

Morning birds in Santiago Apoala. Stereo 48kHz 24bit. UNESCO listing: Tehuacán-Cuicatlán Valley: originary habitat of Mesoamerica Recorded by Erick Ruiz Arellano. ——————— This sound is part of the Sonic Heritage project, exploring the sounds of the world’s most famous sights. Find out more and explore the whole project: https://www.citiesandmemory.com/heritage

Spanning the Douro River, the Dom Luís I Bridge in Porto provides a unique moment of calm in the early hours of the day. The recording captures the peaceful atmosphere, where the distant calls of seagulls and the quiet hum of the city fill the air. In this tranquil setting, the Metro train makes its dramatic entrance, its sound gradually building as it approaches, becoming louder until it passes by, leaving only the faint echoes of its journey. The bridge remains still, with the occasional shift of air and the gentle sounds of the river below, all while the city begins to stir.  This recording encapsulates the quiet tension between the city’s calm morning and the inevitable passage of time marked by the Metro's presence. UNESCO listing: Dom Luís I Bridge Recorded by Serge Bulat. ——————— This sound is part of the Sonic Heritage project, exploring the sounds of the world’s most famous sights. Find out more and explore the whole project: https://www.citiesandmemory.com/heritage

"This piece reflects the birds of Apoala sounding at first light. After 30 seconds there are sounds of music, representing the unique sonic relationship that birds and their songs have with man." Birds of Apoala reimagined by Tallest Trees. ——————— This sound is part of the Sonic Heritage project, exploring the sounds of the world’s most famous sights. Find out more and explore the whole project: https://www.citiesandmemory.com/heritage

 "I grew up close to one of the biggest Catholic pilgrimage destinations in the world - I could never escape bells. I love the way they sound, the seemingly impossible rhythms and beatings they create, and the long ringings. "I wanted to preserve those sounds and rhythms in some way, but at the same time reflect the wanton disregard with which we treat our past. I decided to use the sounds of the bells (however shaped, sliced, and mangled) but let them degrade and fall apart throughout the piece. "In the end, I noticed that the voices captured in the square are at times more discernible than the much louder bells, and it sort of fits what I wanted to communicate. "After listening to the source track for a while, I divided it up into phrases which I then split up into relatively long samples. All the sounds in the piece were built from these samples. I used some short slices and looped them so they could be played like a synthesiser. "The arrangement was spread across a number of loops and machines. A coup

"I wanted to create the sense of multiple trains passing over time by breaking up the sounds into component parts with distortion and delay but also introduced the feeling of being on the train at the same time with the background notes." Dom Luis I Bridge, Porto reimagined by David Cowlard. ——————— This sound is part of the Sonic Heritage project, exploring the sounds of the world’s most famous sights. Find out more and explore the whole project: https://www.citiesandmemory.com/heritage

Blenheim Palace was the birthplace of Britain's most famous Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, and throughout the property there are plenty of reminders of this, including a dedicated permanent exhibition to his life. Attention has been paid to sound in the exhibition, which variously includes mockups of Churchill's voice telling stories about his childhood, Morse code to mark his years in the military, a typewriter to represent his authorial life, and excerpts from his political speeches. This recording is a walkthrough of the exhibition, taking in all of these sounds, on a tour of Churchill's life.  UNESCO listing: Blenheim Palace. Recorded by Cities and Memory. ——————— This sound is part of the Sonic Heritage project, exploring the sounds of the world’s most famous sights. Find out more and explore the whole project: https://www.citiesandmemory.com/heritage

"To start with I was mostly interested in seeing if I could extract the typewriter and morse code sounds and use those rhythms to trigger snippets of Churchill's voice. I wanted to re-code the existing code and tried a variety of techniques including EQ, AI Stem Splitting, Gates, Envelope Followers, distortion and reverb.  "I started to make some overlapping rhythms with the morse code and typewriter sounds and then used a stem split version of Churchill's voice to refocus the piece and make it about his love of riding. I stretched and pitched his voice down 3 semitones to make it sound even fuller - and a bit funnier, and got into the humour of Churchill in a bowler hat riding on ponies around the grounds reminiscing about the war, and his regiment, whilst galloping along at high speed.  "Towards the end of the composition I reintroduced some of the history of the location with the train sound (referencing the 19th century aristocrat, Consuelo Vanderbilt, who married into the family and saved the palace fr

On Palm Sunday during Holy Week, all the cathedral bells are rung. It is a unique moment throughout the year. UNESCO listing: Historic Centre of Mexico City Recorded by Leonardo Santiago. ——————— This sound is part of the Sonic Heritage project, exploring the sounds of the world’s most famous sights. Find out more and explore the whole project: https://www.citiesandmemory.com/heritage

"I love this recording by Leonardo Santiago of the cathedral bells in Mexico City. I was working with a mix of voice, song and sound elements taken from the recording, but then I got sick and couldn’t record the voice elements. So this is a really simple combination of the second part of the recording with a poem I wrote about a visitor descending into the square to the sound of bells." Mexico City cathedral bells reimagined by Melaina Barnes. ——————— This sound is part of the Sonic Heritage project, exploring the sounds of the world’s most famous sights. Find out more and explore the whole project: https://www.citiesandmemory.com/heritage

 "The world is not this world when heard through the auditory spectrum of a snake. It follows, then, that history itself might also shift if perceived outside the limits of human hearing. Naja Nostalgia is a sound work that employs field recording, geophone recordings, synthesizers, and an improvised Viridu performance to recreate the experience of walking through Sri Lanka’s Galle World Heritage Site—but imagined through the auditory perspective of a cobra. With a limited hearing range of approximately 50–1000 Hz, the snake’s acoustic world offers a radically different filter for understanding space, time, and memory. "What became clear during the compositional process was the surprising resonance between the snake’s frequency spectrum and the emotional texture of human nostalgia. The emphasis on low frequencies—vibrations, sub-bass tones, speaker resonance, and analog hiss—echoed the affective registers of longing and melancholia. In this narrowed spectrum, faint auditory artifacts emerged with heightened

Juan imitates the sound of a jaguar with an ancient instrument at Teotihuacan Pyramids. Stereo 48kHz 24bit. UNESCO listing: Pre-Hispanic City of Teotihuacan Recorded by Erick Ruiz Arellano. ——————— This sound is part of the Sonic Heritage project, exploring the sounds of the world’s most famous sights. Find out more and explore the whole project: https://www.citiesandmemory.com/heritage

This recording was captured in Fanal, a vast forested area with an enchanting atmosphere and ancient-looking trees that are part of the indigenous Laurisilva forest. In the recording, you can hear me walking, sounds of people talking, taking photos and wandering through the mist. Between some powerful winds, theres some calmer moments where you can hear the soft patter of raindrops falling from the trees. Given the strong winds and my limited equipment—a small RøDE VideoMic Me-L for iPhone with a basic windscreen—it was challenging to avoid wind noise entirely. To present the best audio experience, I carefully edited and compiled the highest-quality segments in chronological order. Recently, Madeira has been experiencing new influx of tourism, both in type and quantity, and Fanal has caught the attention of many YouTubers and photographers. Having not visited Fanal in several years, I was curious to see how this newfound popularity is shaping the experience and hoped to capture the atmosphere of this phenom

"The field recording I worked with was of a 'Jaguar Whistle', an instrument designed to replicate the sound of a jaguar. My understanding is that in Mesoamerican cultures, the jaguar was a symbol of transformation, bridging the earthly and spiritual realms. Research suggested that Shamans and rulers sought to embody its power, believing they could take on its form to navigate the unseen world, and through ritual practices, including trance states and sacred ceremonies, they invoked the jaguar’s essence to move between life and the underworld, gaining wisdom, strength, and protection.  "The jaguar’s ability to thrive in darkness, water, and hidden places made it a guardian of thresholds, a being capable of transcending the boundaries of human existence. Without the understanding of the cultural importance of the jaguar, the significance of the whistle could be missed. Inspired by this, I created a piece that translates the original recording of the jaguar whistle into a musical form, reflecting its role in tr

"I got inspired of the original recording’s “rough” essence - the windy and rainy weather was dominant, along the noise of the people. For me, it reflects the ongoing change of the climate and amount of tourism which seem to change and grow hand in hand.  "Also the description of the original recording tells about capturing the sound of growing number of people in the misty forests of Fanal, Portugal.  Furthermore, parts the recording was cut out because of the strong wind. The final piece was then edited chronologically, which in a sense made the nature/climate to be the “main director” of the piece. "This raises age-old philosophical questions: How much control do humans truly have - or how much of it is merely an illusion of man-made complex systems that are, in reality, just a small part of nature’s vast complexity? We understand only a fraction of nature—what happens if we stray too far from its ways? Will it” be the final director" that intervenes, cutting humanity’s delusional course to preserve and

"I approached the word 'heritage' from two directions; there is what we receive, 'inherit', (and what we in turn leave) - an imperative to consider how we care for leave behind what we hold precious. But heritage can also indicate efforts to retain what has, realistically, been lost - a simulacrum, second-hand experience. In the context of this project, how much better to protect and experience the real thing. In this track I explored both, using the recording unadulterated and via various resampling techniques." Yellowstone coyotes reimagined by de Velden. ——————— This sound is part of the Sonic Heritage project, exploring the sounds of the world’s most famous sights. Find out more and explore the whole project: https://www.citiesandmemory.com/heritage

Day of the Death at Xoxocotlán cemetery. Families gather around thumbs. Stereo 48kHz 24bit. UNESCO listing: Indigenous festivity dedicated to the dead Recorded by Erick Ruiz Arellano. ——————— This sound is part of the Sonic Heritage project, exploring the sounds of the world’s most famous sights. Find out more and explore the whole project: https://www.citiesandmemory.com/heritage

"After carefully listening to my chosen field recording; Skara Brae, I refreshed my memory and researched the Neolithic site in Orkney.  "I liked how the geofon recording added a mysterious layer, with distant sounding muffled voices and rumbling… I accentuated and extended this mystery. "I imagined the aeons of time that has passed on the site; the prehistoric industry and life, how many visitors from near and far, and the plundering both by man and nature….  "I try to convey this ancient and mysterious location with my track. "I use the original recording looped and sliced using granular synthesis, to create intermittent periods of rhythm, which are then interwoven with multiple channels of modulated noise from a synth with delay and reverb etc. to simulate the maelstrom of time.  "The final recording was tweaked and manipulated in realtime and presented here after slight compression and eq’ing." Skara Brae tourism reimagined by id_23. ——————— This sound is part of the Sonic Heritage project, explor