Today we’re heading to Balboa Island, California, to hear the sounds of evening wind with recordist Marcel Gnauk of Free To Use Sounds. He tells us:

“To get the sound of wind I had to drive down to the Balboa Island at night time to avoid traffic and airplane noises, so I was able to get a cleaner sound of the wind.

“I drove on the island over a small bridge and parked the car on a dead end. I saw this huge palm tree and that was my spot.

“The palm tree leaves danced in the wind and touched the house from time to time. Right next to the palm tree was an American Flag so if you wondering what the “cling” noise is, it is the flag!”

City version:

 

The reimagined sound, by regular contributor Jeff Dungfelder, takes T.S. Eliot as its inspiration:

“With Whispering Ambitions is a new composition based on a field recording of the evening wind on Balboa Island, California.

The song’s inspiration comes from a T.S. Eliot poem:

“After such knowledge, what forgiveness?

Think now History has many cunning passages, contrived corridors

And issues, deceives with whispering ambitions,

Guides us by vanities. Think now

She gives when our attention is distracted

And what she gives, gives with such supple confusions

That the giving famishes the craving.

Gives too late

What’s not believed in, or if still believed,

In memory only, reconsidered passion.

Gives too soon Into weak hands, what’s thought can be dispensed with

Till the refusal propagates a fear. Think Neither fear nor courage saves us.

Unnatural vices

Are fathered by our heroism. Virtues

Are forced upon us by our impudent crimes.

These tears are shaken from the wrath-bearing tree.”

Listening to the wind can open one up to discovering new places within. In this piece the field recording is layered and manipulated to create an almost dreamlike state. Floating, drifting, revolving repetition that hopefully encourages you to let go. Like a whirling dervish in slow motion, shimmering electronic textures swirl inside your head. A mental Sufi dance that lets your thoughts drift with the evening wind.”

Memory version: