Take a sonic tour of Oxford

Over Christmas, we compiled a sound tour of our hometown Oxford for Sonospace – with a difference. It’s a 30-minute mix that takes in both field recordings from the city of Oxford, but also blends in reimagined versions of some of those sounds throughout, as you travel through the real and the imagined versions of the city together. You’ll hear everything from tranquil feeding of the ducks to a techno remix of a car wash, through to anti-ISIS political demonstrations, with contributions from five sound artists. All sounds below are by Cities and Memory unless otherwise indicated, and you can listen to the whole thing here.

Full tracklisting:

• 00:00 – Feeding the ducks in Grandpont (field recording)
• 01:31 – Frideswide Square traffic (field recording blended with remixed version by Laurence Colbert)
• 03:01 – St. Giles fair – win a prize (field recording)
• 04:26 – St. Giles fair – win a prize (remix by Mike Bingham)
• 06:48 – Christian preacher on Cowley Road (field recording)
• 07:34 – Kurdish anti-ISIS protesters on Cowley Road (field recording)
• 08:36 – Cowley Road carnival (field recording)
• 10:53 – Inside a car wash (field recording)
• 12:29 – Inside a car wash (remix by Alan Bleay – all sounds made from the original field recording)
• 17:30 – The church bells of Cumnor (field recording)
• 18:59 – Piano improvisation and road bridge (field recording by Martin Atkins)
• 23:01 – Students in Oxford post office (field recording)
• 23:38 – Singer and preacher on Cornmarket in Oxford (field recording)
• 24:25 – Oxford Cornmarket (remix by Ian de Quadros – all samples made from Oxford field recordings)
• 27:22 – The Quaking Bridge (field recording and remix together)
• 29:30 – Under Grandpont bridge (the first ever field recording on Cities and Memory)