Ice melts differently than it builds and there is more than one way
that melting ice makes noise. I will look for an example as soon as
I can. I remember last recording melting when I had my parabolic
trained on a pair of swans sleeping on the ice on a warm sunny winter
day. The swans did not wake so I do not recall if I saved the
melting sounds. I will look.
Ice does not often remain a sheet as it melts. Due to impurities and
that it is clear, it becomes porous, honey combed and rough
throughout. Small complex crystaline structures form on the top that
break and fall into other structures. This gives a high tinkle. Air
is released to the surface in small bubbles through the honeycomb
also in mass give quiet sounds. The shore with its shallow water and
darker bottom causes the shore to melt before the center. Slush blown
by the wind also gives a high pitch. Icicles formed on a shady shore
edge with slush blowing into them also does. Snow on top of the ice
also collapses into the ice during melting and this is high pitched.
Ice blocks in a river current is a completely different story.
Rich Peet
--- In Syd Curtis <> wrote:
>
>
> > From: John Campbell <>
> >
> >>
> >> At the other end of the dynamic scale, in '72 my wife and I,
courtesy of an
> >> American Forester, Clark Gleason, stopped at a visitor
information station
> >> at an entrance on the eastern side of (I think) Yosemite NP.
Location is
> >> not important anyway. There was a tiny pond covered with a thin
sheet of
> >> ice which was melting with the morning warmth. It made a
heavenly sound.
> >> Very soft, very beautiful. Wished I had a recorder with me.
Not much
> >> opportunity for listening to ice in the subtropics.
> >>
> >> Syd Curtis (Brisbane, Australia)
> >
> > Syd,
> >
> > Well, ya could always stick ya head in ya esky, mate, next time ya
> > gettin out a coldie.
> >
> > But seriously, are there a few descriptive words you could suggest
> > which give some idea of how this sounded? You've aroused my
> > curiousity.
> >
> > John Campbell
>
> Putting the cold tinnie down for a moment, John, I suggest you ask
Bernie
> Krause, he of "Wild Soundscapes".
>
> Mind you, I don't know that Bernie has listened to the music of
melting thin
> ice. In fact, on further reflection, perhaps he hasn't, 'cos if he
had why
> isn't it on his CD with the book? But if he has, he would have the
ability
> to do justice to the sound in words.
>
> My dear wife Anne remembers it as "fairy-like", as pure musical
sounds, a
> sort of tinkling. More prosaically, I can only say, pure musical
notes of
> definite but varied pitch unrelated harmonically, staccato,
pianissimo, and
> irregularly spaced.
>
> Water expands as it freezes I am told, which is why ice floats, and
fish
> don't get frozen. One may conclude that ice contracts as it
melts. And (I
> surmise) a very thin sheet of ice, if remaining anchored to the
shore at its
> edge, cracks as it contracts, and on a perfectly still, quiet day,
each
> crack makes an audible musical note.
>
> BTW, Anne suggests it was in a National Forest rather than a
National Park,
> either Mt Whitney N F, or a N F containing Mt Whitney. She also
suggests
> that if one used a domestic refrigerator to make a thin sheet of
ice, and
> then dropped some boiling water onto it, one might get some similar
sounds.
> I haven't tried it.
>
> Syd
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