An Acoustic Stroll through the Urban Landscape

Abstract

In every moment of our lives we are cradled in our experiences by an intangible sense of the sound of the world around us. When we speak pearls of sound created in our throat are released from our mouths and balloon at 1225 km/hr into spherical orbs with our heads at the centre. If we could see the sounds being emitted all around us we would find ourselves in a field of bubbles with edges that tremble with rippling patterns as they expand outwards. These elusive vibrations are received in our ears and subsequently processed into discernible information by the primary auditory cortex. Three hundred years ago the Māori living at Te Oka pā (located on the coastal headland where in present day the south end of the Harbour Bridge connects to the central city of Tāmaki Makaurau) may have rose from their slumber to the sounds of tarāpuka calling above the waves of Waitemata Harbour and the soft rustle of a sea breeze in the Pōhutukawa and Pūruri. As the day dawned the songs of the Tūī perched in their branches may have intermingled the sound of voices joined in chanting karakia as the hapori gathered to worship the rising sun. On most mornings, my alarm clock jerks me from my dreams into the sonorous sounds of the morning rush hour and the punctuating revs of cars fighting their way up the steep hill next to my home in the suburb of Grey Lynn. There are some sounds here that linger regardless of the span of history, such as the song of our resident Tūī that faithfully sings outside my kitchen window day in and day out. In a way, this text explores what I hear now in the moments that make up my life. It is about sound of the city where I live: Tāmaki Makaurau, Aotearoa (Auckland, New Zealand), and it is also about the common experiences of artists whom, like me, are exploring their own audible worlds through the practice of field recording. Together, in collaboration with all the city dwellers that make so many sounds, we seek a deeper understanding of the city's soundscape.