Glow worm hunt

Recorded at Badbury Rings, Dorset (10 pm, July 26th, 2003). Badbury Rings is a neolithic hillfort close to my home in Dorset. The site has been a local landmark for thousands of years, and today is valued as an archaeological site and is a nature reserve. For me, its main importance is as a haven for wildlife, and as a great place to picnic among the butterflies. The hillfort is constructed as a series of three deep, concentric ditches, which originally enclosed a substantial village that was destroyed by the Romans after 3000 years of habitation. Always a sacred spot, today naturalists are the pilgrims. This piece features recordings of a glow worm hunt made during a warm summer night, involving a group of about 100 people. My interest in soundscape recording lies in exploring how people interact with their environments - a sort of 'acoustic human ecology'. In this piece, the conversations and other sounds made by the glow worm hunters as they move across the site provide the structure and content of the piece: excited anticipatory chatter at the edge of the site is followed by quiet attention as the history of the site is described by an expert. As people enter the enclosed space of the Rings to start hunting, conversation becomes more hushed and the ambience more intimate, particularly when the glow worms are encountered in the darkness. The soundscape finally dissolves as people spread over the site and start to head for home. This piece was featured on the earshot4 CD produced by UKISC, on architectural soundmarks.

All of the compositions and soundfiles accessible via this site are copyleft. All rights reversed. Anyone is welcome to use these soundfiles how they wish, towards a continuing creative process.