Hi Eric,
Regarding your list of "good" anthropogenic sounds, while all of those coul=
d be very important and beautiful sounds to record or otherwise document in=
an ethnographic documentary context, they are outside the domain of nature=
recording. It is not whether a sound is beautiful or important that makes=
it a nature sound.
It is easy for me to understand why a recording of songs of an indigenous c=
ulture would get rejected by a nature sound publisher, as that would be cul=
tural not natural in subject.
Going back to Robin's "Surely by now people realise..." assertion
arguing that that culture and nature are inseparable. While this is a valid=
perspective to a point, it does not have much bearing on defining "nature =
recording".
At the most what this does is move the field of nature recording into a sub=
set of cultural recordings. Once we do that, we might as well consider the =
more general field of phonography or field recording is also inseparable fr=
om the cultural context. A cultural context is assumed for all fields of s=
ound recording, and if anyone disagrees, please give an example where it is=
not.
Even within a subset of ethnography, nature recording can still be defined =
aside from anthropogenic sounds. That is, a nature recording is a sound rec=
ording of a person or people quietly respecting the the sounds of nature.
...as quietly as they can anyway.
John Hartog
rockscallop.org
--- In "Eric" <> wrote:
>
> Hi John,
>
> I'm not sure which "good" anthropogenic sounds Jos=E9 had in mind, but my=
list would include speech, music, sonic art, and laughter, both intentiona=
l and unintentional.
>
> I seem to recall Steven Feld told us, in 1993, a nature environments reco=
rd label would have released his field recordings from the rain forests of =
c, only if it hadn't been "ruined" by the sounds of the indigenous Bosavi =
people. He described their songs as more of conversation with everything li=
ving in the forest. I'd imagine his Voices of the Rainforest CD is an inspi=
ration for many in the Nature Recordists Group.
>
> All the best,
> Eric
>
> --- In "hartogj" <hartogj_1999@> wrote:
> >
> > Hi Jose,
> > At least around here, in North America, many native animal species avoi=
d human presence. The greater the human presence the greater the impact on =
the habitat or ecosystem. Roads create swaths of lower animal diversity and=
population size. Any anthropogenic sounds associated with a human presenc=
e in an area that is considered to be "natural" I might consider "bad" for =
that natural ecosystem, and definitely "bad" for type of nature recording t=
hat I do. Of course transportation sounds from air and highway traffic are =
the worst. Through these sounds of our loud motors we extend our presence d=
eeply into even the most remote corners of our world.
> >
> > Can you give some examples of the "good" anthropogenic sounds you are r=
eferring to?
> >
> > John Hartog
> > rockscallop.org
> >
> >
> >
> > --- In "freitojos" <josefreitas81@> w=
rote:
> > >
> > > Jonh,
> > > I think it is not a good thing to think all antropogenic sound is bad=
. The bad antropogenic sound is noise. We can't avoid antropogenic sounds a=
nd the naturescapes are antropogenic visualy here in Portugal, absolutely i=
mpossible to avoid it here in south europe. So it must exist good antropoge=
nic sound, I know it exists for shure in my memory. So in my recording I am=
not going to avoid good antropogenic sound, I am going to avoid noise or b=
ad antropogenic sound. Recording soudscapes must be pedagogic in the sense =
that it can teach how to avoid make noise and make only good antropogenic s=
ound.
> > >
> > > regards,
> > > Jos=E9
> >
>
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