Hi John,
I'll take you up on your invitation to express my own view. That said, I po=
sed the question without expressing a position because I wanted to hear the=
views of others who have more experience and who might or might not take a=
view on this issue that is more rigorous than my own.
I got thinking about this over the last two weeks, which I spent in Newfoun=
dland.
Maybe I am focused on creating a picture of place, and that this is not the=
same thing as creating a picture of nature, but it seems to me that if one=
wants to capture Cape St. Mary's, it is artificial to pretend that the sea=
birds exist and the fog horn doesn't.
A decision to call a recording of the birds nature recording, but to exclud=
e the fog horn, strikes me as arbitrary and, more importantly, based on a r=
omantic view of the world that is fundamentally unnatural, or at least quit=
e divorced from reality. In other words, I think that the fog horn at Cape =
St. Mary's is part of the natural environment.
I also wondered about this some months ago in Manhattan, when I was 30 stor=
ies above the city, on a Sunday night at 2:00 am, recording the sound of th=
e island, a sound which is a mix of many elements.
Like you, I have recorded rain while standing under a big tree. In my case,=
it was a coniferous tree. The fact is, that kind of recording in a heavy r=
ainstorm can't be done under a coniferous tree, especially up north where t=
he trees are not that big, for more than a brief period without dousing one=
's mic(s). The overwhelming number of so-called natural recordings of rain =
are done under some kind of human-made shelter, which contributes to the so=
und.
I am about to buy a small lodge in Newfoundland in a place that is heavily =
frequented by whales. Next summer, I want to record the above-water sounds =
of whales when they blow. I'll do it from a boat, which will make its own n=
oise as it cuts through the water. I guess that some purists might take the=
view that these will not be legitimate nature recordings because they are =
"contaminated" by the sound of the boat. If so, maybe I'll live with the fa=
ct that the recordings are "deficient :)
Cheers
|