Meet London musician and composer Jess Bryant, who tells how growing up surrounded by singing, and working as a music therapist have shaped her practice. 

Meet Tokyo jazz pianist and sound artist Daisuke Matsubara, who feels freedom sitting at a piano, and whose sonic journey in life began with Pokemon. 

CM wins a Grand Prix from the Académie Charles Cros in Paris.

Meet French painter, sound and video artist Philippe Neau, inspired by water, vibrations, accidents, nature time and space, and a long-time Cities and Memory contributor. 

It’s that time of year again – we’re excited to launch the 2026 Spring Project, an open call for artists all over the world.

Meet Bristol-based composer and musician Tim Saul, a member of hip hop duo Earthling who\’s inspired by Sakamoto, samplers and seagulls.

On Friday 27 February 2026 we launched the Century of Sounds project at the Pitt Rivers Museum in Oxford, taking over the museum for the evening – here are some of the highlights.

We’re delighted to say that Cities and Memory was presented with a “Coup de Coeur” award by the Académie Charles Cros in Paris.

The Century of Sounds: live event at the Pitt Rivers Museum will be livestreamed on our site on Friday 27 February at 6.30pm.

Ways of Listening, a new partnership between Cities and Memory and the Evelyn Glennie Foundation, is open for participation.

Our Century of Sounds project launch event takes over the Pitt Rivers Museum with live music, artists in conversation and more on 27 February.

The best albums released in 2025, including Brighde Chambeuil, Haress, Emily Sprague, Hyloxolos and Seabuckthorn.

A look back at 2025 from the global sound project Cities and Memory, highlighting some of the most important projects, events, sounds and more.

Meet Italian musician Riccardo Fumagalli, who performs under as the figurehead, and whose musical journey has taken him from disintegrating Fisher Price cassettes to going from 0 to 100 on plugins.

Meet Detroit-based DJ, producer and field recordist Rebecca Goldberg, who is inspired equally by the rhythms of her home Motor City, and the rhythms of the sound of transportation.

An open call for artists to join our biggest ever, tenth anniversary Autumn Project – pick a sound and help us remix the world, one sound at a time!

CITIES AND MEMORY: THE FIRST TEN YEARS It’s hard to believe, but Cities and Memory is celebrating its tenth anniversary in 2025! First of all and most importantly, I’d like to say a massive thank you to every single artist who has contributed a recording or a composition to the project at any stage - [...]

Meet Cambridge-based sound and video artist and composer Amanda Stuart, and find out how her inspirations range from Debussy and Monet all the way through to Star Wars sound designer Ben Burt.

Meet Oaxaca-based field recordist, sound designer and composer Erick Ruiz Arellano, whose brilliant recordings were a centrepiece of our Sonic Heritage project – and find out why the sound of a blue whale\\’s blow is so special.

Meet Tallinn-based musician, composer, painter, writer and multidisciplinary artist Paul Beaudoin, whose music explores space, quiet and memory, and for whom the sound of a foghorn has a very special significance.

Meet multidisciplinary sound artist, visual artist, poet and composer Allis Hamilton from NSW, Australia, whose work is influenced by folk stories, myths, fairy tales, ancient traditions, and the natural world.

Meet Edinburgh-based musician Simon Holmes, whose songwriting-based approach to working with field recordings has lit up several recent Cities and Memory projects.

Meet Los Angeles sound artist and field recordist Julian Goldberger, who has been part of more than ten Cities and Memory projects and works under the name Eulipion Corps.

Meet Seattle-based musician and composer Jeff Brown, who joined us for Sonic Heritage and the Spring Project, and whose favourite sounds are middle C and frogs.

Our first live show of the year will be a special fundraising show for the children of Palestine on Friday 29 August in London.

To mark Cities and Memory reaching its tenth anniversary, we’re holding a special in-person meetup for the artist community in London on Wednesday 17 September.

Meet Toronto artist Michelle Breslin, a field recordist, musician and composer working under the name Lostworldsounds, whose favourite sound to record is the soothing and terrifying sounds of the wind.

Meet Syracuse, New York-based field recordist and acousmatic musician Edward Ruchalski, whose sonic journey started with a guitar aged eight and continues today with radio broadcasts, collaborations and lots of contact mics!

Meet long-time Cities and Memory contributor and Ciat Lonbarde synth whizz Andy Billington, who works under the artist name solo1 and prefers to leave the computer screen behind to get hands-on with hardware.

Meet Plymouth-based musician and composer Daniel Chudley – Le Corre, member of 90s psych-pop legends The Monsoon Bassoon and now a Stravinsky and John Zorn-influenced working under various guises.

Meet Connecticut-based multidisciplinary artist Jeff Düngfelder, who works across film, sound, photography and graphic design, and is one of the longest Cities and Memory contributors, taking part in almost every project.

Meet Leeton, Australia-based musician, recordist and sound designer Jason Richardson, who works under the artist name Bassling, whose love for sound began with an unexpected trip to the cinema.

Meet Florence-based composer and performer Cristina Italiani, who blends flute and field recordings and improvises with traditional Mediterranean music and music from the Far East.

Meet sound artist, recordist and sound designer Yiannis Vlastaris, who describes sound as a way to dissolve identity, ego and time, and who performs under the name John Ov3rblast.

Meet New York-based sound artist, musician and composer Bill Stevens, whose work featuring spoken word, field recordings and improvisation is inspired by John Cage, minimalist composers and the jazz greats.

Meet Úrsula Bravo, a nomadic field recordist and sound artist who works on sound ecology and composition under the name of LES (laboratório experimental do som), and loves to capture the sounds of light storms.

Meet sound artist, musician and sound designer Meghan Fohl from Santa Cruz, California, who draws us into her ambient world of stillness and attentiveness under her artist name Firephly.

Contribute to a global sonic compilation in solidarity with Palestine – raising funds through composed sound works.

Meet New Delhi-based field recordist and Indigenous disabled activist Puneet Singh Singhal, whose recordings of the city are about capturing memory in motion and honouring voices that are often left unheard.

Meet Hastings-via-Dundee composer Euan Millar-McMeeken, who creates music under the names Glacis, Civic Hall, The Dead Bell and Gallowglas, and who was part of our Sonic Heritage and Migration Sounds projects.

Meet multidisciplinary artist Simon Kennedy, based in Norfolk, UK and inspired in his sound work by the likes of early modernists and movements including Cubism, Futurism, Constructivism and De Stijl.

Meet sound artist and composer Stefan Klaverdal from Angelholm, Sweden, whose gorgeous piano-led soundscapes have graced several Cities and Memory projects over recent years.

Meet Sardinian sound artist, Cities and Memory contributor and self-professed unreliable narrator Cristina Marras, as she introduces us to her radio art and spoken word-led practice.

Meet Portugal-via-London sound artist and field recordist Rafael Diogo, who has contributed both amazing recordings from remote places and fantastic ambient compositions to the project.

Meet Paris-based field recordist Colin Hunter, who has been contributing beautiful sound recordings of nature, sacred spaces and important places to Cities and Memory since the Covid-19 lockdowns. 

Can you spare ten minutes to help make Cities and Memory better? As we move towards our tenth anniversary, we’re always looking to improve Cities and Memory, so every couple of years we run a community survey to ask YOU how you use the project and how we could make it better for you. Could [...]

NTS Radio broadcast an hour-long special on Sonic Heritage on Thursday 5 June 2025 – you can stream the show on the NTS website. Here is the show info and the full tracklisting and artist credits. Sonic Heritage is the first collection of the sounds of the world’s most famous sights. The project, created by global […]

Open call - 10th anniversary Spring Project As long-time followers of Cities and Memory will know, twice every year we open up our sound archives and invite artists to choose a field recording to recompose, reimagine and remix into a brand new composition - these are the Autumn Project and the Spring Project. Entering our [...]

We have an exciting update for you today – after more than a year in development, we have a brand new sound player on Cities and Memory that allows you explore our full database of more than 7,000 sounds in lots of new ways. If you’ve contributed a recording or composition to the project, you can search by […]

Would you like your field recordings to be heard at the iconic Barbican Centre in London? Now’s your chance – over the next month, we’re working with the Barbican to help you do just that. We’re hosting an exclusive call for the Cities and Memory community to provide the field recordings for a brand new […]

We’re excited to be partnering with the excellent Sound of the Year Awards this year, as the partner for their brand new category, Sound of the City. Submit your favourite field recordings from urban spaces by 28 February, and your recording could be named as one of the sounds of the year. [ld_spacer]{{ vc_btn: title=SUBMIT+YOUR+CITY+SOUNDS&color=danger&size=lg&align=center&css=&link=url%3Ahttp%253A%252F%252Fbit.ly%252Fcitysound2025 [...]

After three months of collecting amazing field recordings from around the world, we’re excited to kick off the new year with the artist call for our first major project of 2025 – Sonic Heritage! The project explores the sounds of the world’s most famous sights, as we use sound to explore concepts of tourism, heritage […]

Some great news to kick off 2025 – I’m incredibly proud to say that more than TWO THOUSAND artists have now taken part in Cities and Memory! I’d like to say a massive thank you to everyone who’s contributed a composition or a recording to the project, and a special thank you to those artists […]

ALBUMS OF THE YEAR 2024 It’s time for what I now understand to be the TENTH annual albums of the year list, so here’s a brief rundown of the previous decade’s (!) worth of winners.  2023 - Swans 2022 - Caterina Barbieri 2021 - Floating Points & Pharaoh Sanders 2020 - Fiona Apple 2019 - [...]

REVIEW OF THE YEAR 2024 As Cities and Memory heads into its tenth year of existence (!), 2024 has had some real landmarks and highlights, which we’re happy to share with you in this brief review of the year. SPRING We began the year with the launch of our latest project, The Sound of Adventure, [...]

[ld_fancy_heading alignment="text-center" transform="text-uppercase"]Migration Sounds roundup[/ld_fancy_heading] Our Migration Sounds project has taken on a life of its own since launching in September - first of all, the team at Oxford University shot this special film all about our installation in the Pitt Rivers Museum. Featuring interviews with project contributors Rafael Diogo and Marc van de Griendt, you can check out [...]

Legendary online radio station NTS will be playing a 30-minute special on Migration Sounds this Sunday 15 December, as part of a 24-hour broadcast marking International Migrants Day. Our programme is a 30-minute mix of field recordings taking you through three aspects of migration: forced migration, diaspora communities and daily life as a migrant. Tune […]

Cities and Memory at Sessions on Listening[ld_spacer] We're excited to be presenting the next edition of Sessions on Listening with World Listening Project next Friday! Cities and Memory founder Stuart will be introducing the project, our approach to sound and some of the key projects we've launched over the last few years - and taking [...]

Pitt Rivers sound installation From 6-8 November 2024, the Pitt Rivers Museum in Oxford hosts a sound installation for our Migration Sounds project. Situated on the first floor balcony, overlooking the incredible Pitt Rivers collection, you will find the Migration Sounds installation. On one side of the space, you will hear field recordings of migration [...]

Three live events in November November is a busy month for Cities and Memory - we're delighted to say we have THREE live events in Oxford taking place. From a full live show to conversation events, sound installations and a very special Migration Sounds live show, we hope to see you at one of the [...]

Cities and Memory x Odyssey Ensemble: exploring migration through sound The Story Museum, Oxford 23 November 2024, 6.30-8.00pm Free entry More info and updates via the Facebook event link. Join us for a unique live event exploring issues of migration through the mediums of sound and music. Odyssey Ensemble and Cities and Memory, in collaboration […]

Migration Sounds is transforming into a live event this November! Join us at the iconic Pitt Rivers Museum for an immersive audio installation capturing the experience of migration through sound, as we bring the Migration Sounds project to life. Alongside this, we will be hosting a conversation event discussing the use of sound to reframe […]

OPEN CALL: JOIN OUR NEW GLOBAL PROJECT SONIC HERITAGE[ld_spacer] We’re delighted to announce our next major project for the coming months - Sonic Heritage - and we’re looking for recordings and artists to take part. The project will explore the sounds of the world’s most famous sights, asking questions around tourism, identity and preservation such as: What are the [...]

OPEN CALL: JOIN THE AUTUMN PROJECT It’s that time of year again – the evenings are getting shorter, the leaves are crunching underfoot, and the Cities and Memory Autumn Project is open for artists! Here’s how it works – twice every year, we open up our sound database for you to choose from, offering up [...]

As part of the Migration Sounds project, we were fortunate enough to receive a series of extraordinary recordings from Frey Lindsay, who spent time aboard the Ocean Viking rescue ship in the Mediterranean in December 2022. The sounds and stories – and the creative responses to them – were incredible, and we’d like to share […]

LAUNCHING TODAY - MIGRATION SOUNDS Today we’re extremely proud to launch one of our biggest projects yet, Migration Sounds! The result of a year-long partnership with the University of Oxford's Centre on Migration, Policy and Society (COMPAS), this is the world’s first collection of the sounds of human migration. {{ vc_btn: title=EXPLORE+MIGRATION+SOUNDS&color=danger&size=lg&align=center&css=&link=url%3Ahttps%253A%252F%252Fcitiesandmemory.com%252Fmigration%252F }} The project [...]

We're extremely saddened to hear the news that regular Cities and Memory contributor and friend of the project Michael Lilley passed away last week. Not just a very regular - and highly imaginative - contributor to the project, we were also privileged to spend time with Michael at several of our London in-person meetups, where [...]

A soundscape from Boston Common to listen to today, as a busker plays an amplified Chinese traditional stringed instrument for passers-by, competing with the industrial drones of leaf-blowing machinery, but cutting through very clearly as we pass closer and closer by him. City version: Graeme Worsfold’s reimagined track takes this field recording to a completely […]

A soundscape from the liminal airport space today, as we visit Boston Logan. In this field recording, as you arrive into Terminal E down the moving walkways, announcements about Boston’s civic pride are piped down to accompany your first experience of the city, as mayor Michelle Wu proudly extols the virtues of “the city of […]

Something a little different today, as we spend time in a quiet coffee shop in Sao Paulo, Brazil, in this field recording by Rodrigo Leles. He tells us that “you can hear customers and staff in the background, as well as some espressos coming out, milk steaming and coffee beans grinding. It’s the kind of […]

A gorgeous early morning soundscape for you today, with this field recording by Alex Banaszkiewicz from Miholjače, Bosnia-Herzegovina. Alex writes: “On an August morning, I managed to record a quiet weekday in the village of 600 inhabitants. Beautiful, sunny weather, light wind and wonderful aura of this place.” City version: This sound is accompanied by […]

This field recording comes from Alexandria, Egypt, and forms part of the Cities and Memory Alexandra city sound guide by Rafael Diogo, which you can explore in full here. Rafael writes: “The Zanket El Setat night market is a night market in Alexandria, Egypt, where vendors and street food stalls come together to create a […]

Today’s field recording comes from a beautiful spot in Rome, Italy, In this recording we’re taking a tour of the boating lake by the Tempio di Esculapio in the Villa Borghese Park. A harp busker performs, we walk around the lake listening to passers-by on a Sunday morning in April, and a police helicopter passes […]

On a long day of field recording, capturing the sounds of some of London’s most multicultural districts for our Migration Sounds project, we stumble across a rooftop bar in Peckham. On this lazy Saturday afternoon in south London, a Latin jazz and funk band is entertaining people from all walks of life at this bar […]

Another gorgeous field recording from Venice, Italy, as we experience through sound a moment of calm in the late afternoon on Riva di Biasio, looking out at the the Grand Canal. The classic sounds of boat traffic cruising past that make Venice sound like no other city on Earth. A vaporetto (water taxi) passes by […]

This field recording was made at Pat Busch, a reserve situated high up in the mountains about two hours outside of Cape Town, and it captures something of the dramatic beauty and expansiveness of the mountainous areas of South Africa. In Catherine Boulle’s recording, you can hear the reserve’s rich bird life, which includes fish […]

The Szechenyi Baths in Budapest is the largest medicinal bath in Europe, opening in 1913, and now attracts tens of thousands of tourists every year, as well as locals from across the city. In this field recording, we are inside a hissing aromatherapy steam room, severely endangering our field recording device through heat and moisture […]

Today we take a trip to Paris, with a field recording of church bells at Saint Nicolas des Champs in Le Marais, Paris in December 2023. There are two major roads either side of the church, which are constantly busy with noisy traffic and mean that this once peaceful oasis is almost drowned out by […]

Open call – join the Cities and Memory Spring Project It’s that time of year again – the evenings are getting longer, the birdsong is more beautiful and intense than ever, and the Cities and Memory Spring Project is open for artists! Here’s how it works – twice every year, we open up our sound [...]

A walkthrough across Venice’s iconic Rialto Bridge, through the market at the bottom of the bridge, and out into Campo San Giacomo di Rialto. In this quiet square just away from the hustle and bustle of one of Venice’s most popular tourist spots, all we can hear is the gentle trickle of a water fountain, […]

Migration Sounds artist applications[ld_spacer] Applications for musicians and sound artists for our first major project of 2024, Migration Sounds, are now open. We have a limited number of spaces available for artists on the project, so Cities and Memory and COMPAS will be selecting participating artists from the applications based on your answers to the [...]

Our Migration Sounds project is featured across the BBC today, as we call for recordings of migration, settlement, home and diaspora communities from all over the world. You can read the lead BBC feature here, and listen to a clip from this morning’s Today Programme on BBC Radio 4: More about Migration Sounds Migration Sounds […]

We’re looking for YOUR recordings for our latest global project, Migration Sounds. The project is the first large-scale public exploration of the sounds of migration and settlement, and we think it’s going to be a really important way to use sound to help reframe conversations and public discourse around migration. It’s really important to say […]

[ld_fancy_heading alignment="text-center"]REVIEW OF THE YEAR 2023[/ld_fancy_heading] It’s been another huge year for Cities and Memory, as the project continues to grow in terms of sounds, countries covered and most importantly artists getting involved.  This is our review of 2023, but the first and most important thing to say is a huge THANK YOU to everyone [...]

Albums of the year 2023 It’s hard for us to believe, but this year is the tenth anniversary of our albums of the year roundup, and it’s been another spectacular year for new discoveries and for brilliant comebacks from much-loved artists.  Without further ado, let’s dive into our favourite 20 albums of 2023, but here [...]

We’re delighted to say that Cities and Memory will be travelling to Belfast in November to present a seminar and live performance at Queen’s University. Cities and Memory founder Stuart Fowkes will be presenting a seminar from 1pm on Wednesday 22 November and is open to everyone, so please do come along if you’re in […]

[ld_fancy_heading alignment="text-center"] Open call – join the Cities and Memory Autumn Project! [/ld_fancy_heading] It’s that time of year again – the leaves are falling from the trees, the evenings are getting shorter, and the Cities and Memory Autumn Project is open for artists! This is your last chance to get involved with Cities and Memory in [...]

Today we’re really happy to launch the artist callout for our project The Sound of Adventure, a collaboration with adventure travel specialists Exodus Travels. Over the last two months, a hand-picked group of recordists have been out in the field, capturing sounds from countries in the “most visited destinations” list, with everything from traditional Masai […]

We’d love to invite anyone in London who’s contributed to Cities and Memory, or is in any way interested in what the project does, to an informal drink or two on Wednesday 13 September.  It’s a great chance to meet some like-minded audio folks for a chat and a drink. We did this once before in […]

We’re excited to present a brand new global project for you to get involved with – and this one is a very special paid commission for field recordists and musicians! We’ve teamed up with responsible adventure holiday company Exodus Travels to mark their 50th anniversary with a very special project exploring the world of adventure […]

Today we’re excited to launch the first stage of our new global project, Music for Sleep – and we’d love you to be a part of it! Music for Sleep is a collaboration between artists and field recordists to create a worldwide, wide-ranging collection of precious compositions specifically designed to induce, aid and boost sleep. […]

Happy World Piano Day! To mark this wonderful annual celebration of such an important instrument, we’ve compiled a few highlights from Cities and Memory compositions over recent projects that use the piano as a central element – these are sounds that combine the piano with the sounds of the world to create something new. We […]

Twice per year, we unlock the Cities and Memory vaults and invite you inside to help us remix the world, one sound at a time – this is the Spring Project open call! If you’d like to reimagine a sound to be part of the Cities and Memory global sound map, this is a great […]

Our Polar Sounds project has been in the news all over the world over the last few weeks – and we’ve collected together a few of the highlights here for you to read, listen to and enjoy: Interview on BBC Radio 4’s Today Programme Feature on CBC Canadian radio Polar Sounds on BBC 6music news […]

Cesuna, northern Italy: in this field recording, church bells ring in the forest just outside the entrance to a long pedestrian tunnel that is part of a footpath made from an old train track. The train track ran from Asiago to Rocchette and has now been converted into a walking trail. On this cold December […]

The storming of the Bastille prison on July 14, 1789 has been commemorated in France for more than a century. Today, the festivities of July 14 are as popular as ever and in Paris, the celebrations culminate with a magnificent fireworks display at the Eiffel Tower, as captured by Colin Hunter – you can also […]

The Sao Bento train station in Porto, Portugal is a stunning space and no mistake – the entrance hall is full of beautiful azulejo tile images depicting scenes from Portuguese history, and the experience is more like walking into a historical palace than a train station. Of course, given that it’s possibly one of the […]

Looking back, we’ve been compiling our annual best albums of the year lists since 2014, which makes this our eighth attempt at summarising our favourite music from the last 12 months (first winner? Einstürzende Neubauten in 2014). Whereas last year’s unifying thread among our favourite albums was an attempt to tackle the themes and politics […]

It's been another huge year for the Cities and Memory project, with our global sound map hitting 110 countries and territories, and international projects launched covering shortwave radio, urban well-being and disappearing sounds. Here's how our 2022 panned out - and a massive THANK YOU to every single artist who took part this year, and [...]

Today sees the launch of Obsolete Sounds, the biggest ever collection of the obsolete and disappearing sounds of the world, covering everything from dusty VHS cassettes, vintage video games and old mobile phones to melting glacier ice and endangered traditional songcraft. The project documents not just the much-missed sounds that evoke memories from the past, but […]

For today’s field recording, we’re taking a trip to the Igreja Matriz de Sao Sebastiao church in Ponta Delgada (Sao Miguel, the Azores), where church bells ring out and play their daily melody at midday, taking their place among the sounds of daily life in the town. City version: Micca reimagined this sound into a […]

Today’s sound is a field recording of a classic New York soundscape, walking through midtown Manhattan starting from 8th & 37th late at night. As well as the ubiquitous traffic noise, vehicle brakes and horns, we can hear snippets of conversation from passers-by. City version: The reimagined composition is built from a sound walk from […]

We’re delighted to let you know that The British Library is now archiving all Cities and Memory field recordings and original compositions as part of its permanent digital archive, the Sound and Moving Image Catalogue. All sounds that are uploaded via our podcast will automatically enter into the British Library archive on a permanent basis […]

The Cities and Memory community has launched onto Discord! If you’re a Discord user, join us for an open space in which we can discuss anything related to sound, field recording, composition, music-making and of course Cities and Memory projects. We’re hoping the space will also become somewhere to make connections with fellow artists from […]

This piece from our Well-Being Cities project is based on a field recording from Zealandia, formerly known as the Karori Wildlife Sanctuary. This is a protected natural area in Wellington, New Zealand, the first urban completely fenced ecosanctuary, where the biodiversity of 225 ha of forest is being restored. You can hear lots of cicadas […]

Often when you visit a new city in a new country, it’s the most everyday sounds that immediately stand out to you as exotic, as different – the sounds that residents quickly come to ignore as part of the tapestry of their daily lives. Outside the Vrije Universitat in Amsterdam, we listen to the sounds […]

The next stop on our tour of the Well-Being Cities project is Havana, Cuba, where a field recording of a street soundscape by Jack Hyde starts with crowds going about their daily business. Halfway through, some wonderful Cuban music plays from a nearby bar as we walk past, creating a wonderfully lively atmosphere. City version: […]

Join us in Paris, as this field recording takes us to the Trocadero metro station, where a group of Jewish musicians play a klezmer-style arrangement of the traditional song Shalom Aleichem, which is typically sung on Friday evenings upon returning home from synagogue prayers and means “peace be upon you”. This performance represents one aspect […]

Our next highlighted sound comes from Copenhagen, Denmark, where we tune in a field recording of the yearly test of the citywide emergency siren system reserved for major emergencies, times of war etc. In 2020, it came in the midst of the Covid-19 lockdown – which though easing greatly at that time – rendered it oddly […]

We kick off our tour of some of sounds from our Well-Being Cities project in Lima, Peru, with this field recording of ambience recorded in a garden in a house (Inca Repac). When considering well-being in cities, it’s important not just to head to the most culturally or historically significant areas to judge its health […]

Today we’re excited to launch a very special global project – Well-Being Cities. It’s a unique collaboration between Cities and Memory and C40, a global network of mayors of nearly 100 world-leading cities collaborating to deliver the urgent action needed right now to confront the climate crisis. The project asks artists to reimagine a curated [...]

Join us at the Emirates Stadium in north London for a slice of live football action from Arsenal vs. Leicester City on 13 March 2022, taking field recording a little more literally than usual. We join the match just as Thomas Partey scores the first goal in a 2-0 win, provoking wild celebrations, cheering and […]

The first new full London Underground line since 1979 opened on 24 May 2022, in honour of the (recently-passed) Queen Elizabeth II. We jumped on board the line on its very first day to make this field recording of the sounds from journey from Farringdon to Paddington. Tune in to hear carriages, doors opening, announcements […]

It’s that time of year again! Once every year, we open up the vaults to the Cities and Memory database of field recordings and invite artists to help us remix and reimagine the sounds of the world. Just drop us an email if you like to take part. We’re giving artists full access to our latest [...]

Looking directly south from Caloura in the Azores, there’s a good chance that if you sailed directly south the next land you hit might be Antarctica. Staring out at the horizon, with only the wheeling birds overhead anchoring us back to dry land, the temptation to contemplate the infinite is even stronger than the usual […]

The bell tower at the University of Coimbra, Portugal is the highest point of the city, visible from almost anywhere and aptly symbolising how the university sits at the centre of life here. The bell is known in Portuguese as El Cabra, which is translated as “the goat” – however, “goat” is also used as […]

Cities and Memory visited the Dar A Ouvir festival in Coimbra, Portugal this month, with a live performance and artist talk – and also a sound installation that runs through until September. For those who obviously can’t visit Coimbra, we’re sharing our brand new installation for you to listen to here: The voice of the […]

We're proud to announce an open call for an exciting global sound project, one that brings together art and science to investigate the sounds of the world's most remote locations - the polar seas. Polar Sounds is a unique project asking artists to reimagine some of the little-heard sounds of the Arctic and Antarctic regions, reflecting on [...]

We’re delighted to be spending this weekend in Coimbra, Portugal as part of the Dar A Ouvir 2022 festival at the stunning Convento São Francisco. Throughout the weekend, an installation of field recordings from across the Cities and Memory project will form part of an installation called A Voz do Mundo II. (Facebook event here) […]

Join the Well-Being Cities project Our latest global sound project is here, and it’s a unique opportunity to have your sonic compositions featured at the global C40 World Mayors Summit in Buenos Aires. Well-Being Cities is a unique collaboration between Cities and Memory and C40, a global network of mayors of nearly 100 world-leading cities […]

The time has come for our latest call for artists – we’re looking for participants in our new project Obsolete Sounds, reimagining and remixing the obsolete and disappearing sounds of the world! Obsolete Sounds is the world’s biggest collection of disappearing sounds and sounds that have become extinct – remixed and reimagined to create a […]

Open call: your recordings of obsolete sounds wanted Our latest global sound project is called Obsolete Sounds - and it will be the world’s biggest collection of disappearing sounds and sounds that have become extinct. We're looking for YOUR recordings of obsolete and disappearing sounds from all over the world to be part of the [...]

Cities and Memory is looking for contributions of field recordings from across Africa as part of our global mapping of the sounds of the world. Our global sound map is one of the biggest sound projects in the world, with 5,000 sounds covering more than 100 countries and territories, and more than 1,000 artists taking […]

The world of shortwave radio listening often captures the final moments of a radio station somewhere in the world making its last announcement before closing down forever, and our Shortwave Transmissions project captures the melancholy of several final broadcasts, three of which we break down for you here, along with compositions built from those recordings. […]

Where there are radio broadcasts, there are radio presenters talking about the weather. We present four selections from the Shortwave Transmissions project in which weather reports are reimagined in all manner of different and extraordinary ways. Settle back and listen to our reimagined weather forecasts. First up, tune in to ZMH286 Gulf Harbour Radio. reporting weather […]

Our Shortwave Transmissions project contains shortwave radio broadcasts from all over the world, including a very interesting selection of compositions based on broadcasts across the Middle East – so here’s a short tour of the region as heard on shortwave. First up, we’re off to Saudi Arabia, which obtained new transmitters in the 1970s and […]

Last night, WFMU played out a special Cities and Memory programme, which included the broadcast debut of our sonic study of Venice, Sedimento, plus a walkthrough of a few of our favourite recent sounds from the project. Tune in to the show in full:   Show tracklist: 1. Alex Hehir – The Horses of Seville […]

We couldn’t let the opportunity pass to let you know about an amazing event taking place this Sunday 20 February at the Barbican in London, organised by our friends at Nonclassical – and if you’re not in London, fear not, as you can also tune in online to a livestream of the whole event, with a special Cities and Memory […]

We’re delighted to launch our first ever Cities and Memory vocal track today – it’s a special collaboration with the super-talented Elska, which we think has come out sounding rather splendid. Starting with a binaural field recording of waves crashing onto an Italian beach last summer, we built a music track around the sample. In the instrumental track, […]

Number stations are one of the great radio mysteries – shortwave radio stations broadcasting apparently-random sequences of numbers being read aloud (by a human or a synthesised voice). Their purpose is not confirmed, but widespread theories include undercover broadcasts from government agencies and espionage – whatever their origins, they’re a fascinating listen and there are […]

Today is UNESCO World Radio Day, and to celebrate we’re proud to announce the launch of our latest global project, Shortwave Transmissions! We’ve teamed up with our friends at the Shortwave Radio Archive to present more than 120 incredible recordings covering eight decades of the history of radio – all remixed and reimagined by artists [...]

Join us for a walk along the beautiful Pingo River in Chilean Patagonia, as we trek towards the Cascado Salto waterfall and take some field recordings along the way. Our first recording is the water flowing past from one spot on the bank, and we move further on in the second recording from today’s selection. […]

As the Covid-19 pandemic rages on, it continues to alter the sounds of our world, too. On board this regional train from Vicenza to San Pietro in Gù in northern Italy during January 2022, you can hear announcements including reminders about testing and mask wearing on board all trains, as different countries’ Covid policies continue […]

We’re in Berendrecht, Belgium, in November 2021, listening in to an armistice commemoration service recorded by Tony Van Dorst, who describes the scene: “”The local fanfare ‘Koninklijke Fanfare Willen is Kunnen’ from Berendrecht is participating in the yearly Armistice Commemoration.” ILUITEQ from Italy have reimagined this Belgian armistice commemoration into a moment of celebration in […]

A new sound for a new year, with this field recording taken in Venice on New Year’s Eve 2021, outside Santa Lucia train station in Venice. The bells nearest the train station are ringing for early evening mass while people hurry in and out of the station to carry on with their new year plans. […]

Happy new year everyone! First of all, let us take this chance to wish everyone a healthy and happy 2022. To mark the new year, we have an exciting brand new set of field recordings available for artists to reimagine and remix throughout January and February. If you’d like a creative challenge this January, please [...]

2021 has been many things, but unexpectedly it's also been one of the busiest and most exciting years since Cities and Memory launched six years ago. We've released seven global sound projects, ten albums (including two physical releases for the first time), presented the project at the Sorbonne and even found time to release a [...]

Well, it’s been another unprecedented year in a seemingly-endless parade of unprecedented years, but once again it has been a fantastic year for new music, as many of the fruits of what musicians had been up to under lockdown and responding to the global pandemic came to light. For me in 2021, the very best [...]

It's time for our final release of 2021 - and the shortest day of the year is the perfect time to release an EP entirely built from the sounds of night. As the clocks went back and the evenings grew long, Cities and Memory issued long-standing collaborator Karhide with a challenge - to work with [...]

It’s that time of year again! We’re proud to present our compilation of some of the best reimagined compositions and field recordings of the year - Sounds of the Year 2021 is here. You can download the album for free or on a pay-whatever-you-like basis now, and this year’s edition features some incredible pieces, including: - A modular synth [...]

We’re excited to share with you our latest collection of field recordings and brand new compositions – Sounds from Italy! Today we’re sharing hundreds of sounds from right across the country, from the mighty Dolomites and the volcanic beaches of Stromboli to the bustling urban centres of Milan, Rome and Turin. And of course, there’s […]

Over the past few years we’ve enjoyed a few trips to football matches across Italy to capture some of the noise and passion of the game, both before and after the global pandemic. From the cathedral of the sport that is San Siro in Milan to Serie B’s more down-to-earth Stadio Tomobolato in Cittadella, these […]

Shortwave radio is one of the most fascinating sonic worlds – capturing vital moments in world history as well as pirate radio, clandestine stations, secretive number stations and military and spy radio, all of humanity is there to be listened to at the turn of a dial. We’re delighted to have teamed up with The […]

Cities and Memory founder Stuart Fowkes was interviewed on BBC Radio 4’s Sunday programme on 12 September about the Inferno project, marking the 700th anniversary of the death of the poet Dante. The interview features an overview of the project, talking about the inspiration behind it and featuring selected sound clips from the Inferno sound […]

Hope you’ve been having a great summer! We’ve been travelling through Italy recording a brand new collection of sounds for you to remix and reimagine, and it’s now ready to go. If you’d be interested in reimagining a field recording from Italy, just send us an email to let us know, and we’ll send you […]

Today’s sounds highlight two distinct sides of the sonic life of Venice – the better-known world of heavy tourism, and the daily life of Venetian citizens far away from Piazza San Marco or the Rialto Bridge. Visiting Venice on a normal weekday in September 2020, there were far fewer tourists to be seen than ever […]

Today’s sound is from one of the world’s most fascinating cities – Bangkok, Thailand. Shaun Malone captured a field recording from the Erawan shrine, which has its own fascinating history, apparently built in 1956 on the advice of an astrologer, as part of the government-owned Erawan Hotel to eliminate the bad karma believed to be […]

It’s time to explore the stunning city of Sarajevo in sound – you can already read our Sarajevo city guide by Rafael Diogo, but as an extra treat today we have two brilliant compositions built from the sounds of the city.

Let’s take a trip to the charmingly-named Zealandia nature reserve outside Wellington, New Zealand, for this natural soundscape recorded by Richard Watts: “Zealandia is a nature reserve in Wellington – in this field recording, you can hear lots of cicadas and various birds including a Tūī.” City version: Zealandia was reimagined by Eulipion Corps, who […]

We're excited to let you know that we've teamed up with the excellent music magazine Electronic Sound on their special field recording issue this month. We've collaborated with Electronic Sound on a special double-CD album release, which contains an entire disc of highlights from right across the Cities and Memory project - while the first [...]

One of the great natural events of this year has been the Brood X phenomenon, in which every 17 years cicada nymphs tunnel upwards from underground and hatch en masse, in their trillions. Brood X is one of 15 broods of periodical cicadas that appear regularly throughout the eastern United States – Andrew Wilkinson sent […]

Let’s tun in to a field recording by Bobby Jewell from the Kill The Bill protest in Parliament Square, London on 2 April 2021. Bobby told us the following: “This recording was taken at the London Day of Action, as part of the National Weekend of Action in protest against the Police, Crime, Sentencing and […]

Airports are surely the ultimate liminal space, linking worlds together through a place that is neither one nor the other – at the same time, every airport feels the same, but also has its own quirks and similarities. Today’s highlights from the Until We Travel project take us on a tour of airport sounds, investigating […]

On a visit to the iconic Jurassic Coast tourist attraction of Durdle Door, the beach was suddenly cleared of people by site security, as a search and rescue helicopter was called to take off someone in distress to hospital. This recording captures the helicopter arriving and coming in to land, briefly circling before descending onto […]

Pre-flight announcements are different all over the world, and as well as the differences from airline to airline, there’s a cultural specificity to many of them. Before an internal flight from Jeddah to Riyadh, a supplication to Allah for safety in travel is broadcast after the regular safety announcements you’d expect to hear on a […]

The maglev train in Shanghai is the fastest commercial electric train in the world, with a cruising speed of 431 km/h, with a 30km journey completed in 7 minutes and 20 seconds. In this field recording by Mark Wilden, we’re on board this super-sleek, super-fast transportation. City version: There’s not much going on in the […]

Our recent project Until We Travel featured some incredible sounds from voyages across the world’s biggest country – Russia’s railway network is, as you might expect, extremely extensive, and there are many ways to reimagine it. Today’s post highlights three fantastic remixes of Russian rail travel. First up, let’s listen to a sound from the […]

It’s summertime, so we’re taking the opportunity to open up the Cities and Memory sound database to you all and to ask – “will you help us remix the world?” We’re looking for artists to reimagine a sound from around the world throughout June and July, and we’ve had some very special, fascinating submissions for you to choose from. Sound good? […]

The second of June marks Festa della Repubblica in Italy, one of the national symbols of the country, with a central celebration taking place every year in Rome. We were there in 2017 to record the sounds of the parade, as every possible branch of the Italian military marched past, each playing their own anthems […]

Lisbon is a stunning city – and some of its transportation is among the most iconic in Europe, most notably its famous tram system. On our sonic tour of Lisbon, our first stop is aboard the tram network, as recorded first by Luís Antero, who writes: “This is a trip on the famous and old […]

What does the sound of a luggage bag being dragged along mean to you? For Loz Colbert, who performs with the band RIDE, it became a document of life travelling as a musician, as he told us when he sent this field recording from Paris: “”I recorded the sound of my luggage bag on various […]

We’re off to South Korea today, to tune into this wonderful, detailed soundscape from the Seoul airport Incheon International, recorded by Marcel Gnauk. City version: The recomposition of Seoul airport by de Velden resulted in this excellent piece: “I wanted to explore the sense of buildings without people, of buildings dreaming of people. I built […]

The idyllic sounds of morning life in a small village in rural Yorkshire, England. It’s 10am on a Sunday morning in Dent, and we’re sitting in a churchyard, overlooking the fields from a hill. We’re surrounded in the trees and bushes by all kinds of birds making their spring announcements, while down in the fields […]

Haiti becomes the 104th country and territory to be reflected on our global sound map with this recording from a rural spot near Fontaine in Haiti by Connor Orrico, featuring children playing, mobile music, breakfast and the sound of a water pump. City version: What stood out from the original recording was the sound of […]

We’re delighted to say that our latest global collaborative sound project is now open for submissions – here’s how you can get involved! Until We Travel will be the biggest ever showcase of the sounds of travel from all over the world. Almost a year has passed since the first global Covid-19 lockdowns, and the world of […]

On a trip to Saudi Arabia, we visited the KAUST university complex, about 90 minutes north of Jeddah. As part of the evening’s entertainment, we were greeted by an hour or so of traditional Saudi music, driven principally by multiple drummers and two interacting singers running through a repertoire of what were apparently well-known songs. […]

Almost a year has passed since the first global Covid-19 lockdowns, and the world of travel changed completely for us all. That’s why our latest global project, Until We Travel, aims to showcase the sounds of travel both as a record of how much the sounds of our world have changed in the past 12 months, […]

It’s mid-August in the incredibly beautiful town of Arquà Petrarca in northern Italy (hear more from this town here), where the poet Petrarch spent most of his days. On this balmy, hot day, we listen to the cicadas in the trees chattering out their constant chorus – a hazy, evocative sound that’s truly the background […]

Today’s field recording is a journey to Varanasi, India by Mike Bingham, who tuned into a fascinating daily ritual in the city: “Dashashwamedh Ghat is the main ghat in Varanasi on the Ganga River. Ganga Aarti (ritual of offering prayer to the Ganges river) is held daily at dusk. Several priests perform this ritual by […]

A peaceful field recording from Scotland by Jessa Davies – this is the sound of the waves at Cromarty beach recorded in the summer of 2020. The faint hum of work on the retired oil rigs in the Firth can be heard. City version: For the reimagined piece, the natural rhythm of the waves on […]

Today we’re exploring one of the most typical sounds of life in the Italian mountains – cowbells. After a long walk on Monte Grappa in northern Italy and a late lunch in a lovely mountainside malga, we looked down the mountainside and listened to the sound of cows feeding, their bells ringing out for hundreds […]

What does a world tour with one of the world’s biggest bands, Foals, sound like? That’s the question our project Audio-Cartographic Experiments answers. It’s a collaboration with artist Kit Monteith, who performs as a percussionist with the Foals live band, and he composed and recorded this album during their 2019 world tour. In each of the cities the […]

We’re delighted to say that the first ever Cities and Memory-related vinyl record is out now – The Leaf Library have committed their reimagined version of our Murano glass-making factory recording to rather smart lathe-cut clear vinyl, as you can see below. And here’s a clip of the record in action on our record player: […]

Two absolutely beautiful pieces for you today from the island of Murano in Venice (and you can hear more of our sounds from Venice here). Murano is world-famous for its glass-making master craftsmen, a centuries-old tradition of hand-blown and hand-shaped glass passed down through generations. Many glass factories do demonstrations of their craft, but this […]

Hiking on Monte Grappa in northern Italy on an extremely cloudy and foggy day, the visibility on the mountain paths was down to just a few metres. Stopping for a break, we encountered this beautiful sounds of birds calling out to one another through the mist – the sound was reflecting off the mountainside with […]

It’s time for albums of the year, everyone. 2020 might have been the most well-documented Bad Year of most of our lifetimes, but, hey – silver lining! – there’s been some fantastic music released to help us get through it all. Here are our top 20 picks for 2020, from mind-melting psych and walls of […]

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What are the best sound tools of 2020?  Every year, we ask some of our most regular contributing artists to unlock their box of sonic secrets and tell us more about the instruments, synths, effects or plugins they’ve been using most over the last year – as with the previous editions in 2019, 2018 and […]

We’re deep inside Dante’s Inferno, and today’s zone is where the lustful are damned and tortured, represented in sound by these two compositions. First up is Kenneth Lyons’ wonderfully-inventive piece: ““A Slow Hot Kiss of Wind” addresses the elemental environment in the zone of the Lustful into which Dante enters early into his journey. It […]

Our journey into Dante’s Inferno continues, and today we’re suspended in Limbo, with four pieces from this liminal space in Hell, the first of which comes from Warren Daly. “My composition tries to capture the varied emotions of being ensnared in limbo. “I used field recordings from a tropical forest in order to mirror Dante’s journey. […]

Dante and Virgil pass through the Vestibule of Hell, hearing the screams of the Uncommitted, and reach the ferry across the river Acheron that will finally take them into Hell itself – today’s pieces from the Inferno project cover the Vestibule and Acheron, so let’s take a listen. First up, Sherman and Field take us […]

We continue our tour of the Inferno, and today we reach the gate of Hell – Canto Three represents Dante’s last moments in the earthly realm before entering Hell – and contains the most famous lines of the entire Divine Comedy. “Lasciate ogni speranza, voi ch’intratre” / “Abandon all hope, ye who enter here” The […]

Our heroes venture first of all into the Dark Forest, a foreboding space that leads them to the gate of Hell – and two artists have built us a dark forest in sound to explore. First up is Angela Winter, whose piece is titled “Selva oscura, amor mi mosse” “‘Midway upon the journey of our […]

Our Inferno project launches today, bringing Dante’s vision of Hell to life through sound – over the coming days we’ll be taking you on a trip through some of the zones of the Inferno to hear some of the fantastic contributions to the project, marking 700 years of The Divine Comedy. We start – naturally […]

We were fortunate enough to spend some time in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, and one of the defining sounds of the city is very obviously the five-times-per-day call to prayer – the call to prayer sound is today’s focus in our Future Cities world tour. In different parts of the city at different times of the […]

The next stop on our tour of the world’s urban sounds takes us to where Europe and Asia meet on the Bosphorus – let’s tune in to Istanbul sounds. The call to prayer is a classic sound of the city, and David Webb recorded this one on a hill in the cemetery at Eyüp in Istanbul […]

Our Future Cities world tour is heading to Russia to tune into Moscow sounds today – and where better to start than the iconic and truly impressive metro system with its grand marbled halls. Here, a powerful string duet performs at the entrance to Arbatskaya station. On board the metro City version: This  string duet […]

The next stop on our Future Cities tour of the world’s cities is Santiago, Chile, a metropolis nestled at the foot of the Andes – with more than six million citizens, it’s one of the biggest cities in Latin America, and a vibrant, fascinating place to visit. Our Santiago sounds begin with start off by […]

The next stop on our Future Cities tour of the world’s cities is another of its most iconic – Paris. Come with us and explore some of the fascinating sounds of this wonderful city – and hear how it’s brought inspiration to artists in their reimagined versions. We start by the banks of the Seine, […]

Having launched our Future Cities project to map how the sounds of our cities are changing, we’re heading off on a tour of the world to listen in to some of its most fascinating urban spaces. What better place to start than the ultra-modern metropolis of Tokyo? Here we tune into two Tokyo sounds – […]

It’s National Poetry Day on 1 October, so to mark the occasion, we thought we’d bring together a few occasions on which poetry has been absolutely central to how an artist has reimagined the sounds of the world – when a poem is at the heart of a recomposed piece, it’s often very beautiful. Arquà […]

Join us in Malaysia today, to hear the traditional handicrafts of a tinsmith, as recorded by Connie Lim Keh Nie, who writes: “Listening to various pitches from hammer and tongs emanating from the tinsmith shops along China Street, clicking and clacking with rhythm, the tins were solely handcrafted. “There are no mechanized machines used; only […]

We’re currently spending a little bit of time in northern Italy, recording and reimagining some of the sounds we come across in the process – today’s is from the beautiful town of Possagno. At five o’clock, the bells at Chiesa di San Rocco high up on a hill overlooking the town chime out for an […]

After completing its maiden voyage during June 2020, the world’s largest ship, the HMM Algeciras docks in Essex in the UK to unload cargo. The ship is, unbelievably, 400m long and 61m wide – which is longer than the height of London skyscraper The Shard (310m). The ship’s arrival into the UK was a major […]

Here we have a very special recording from Colin Hunter – one that allows us to hear inside the Eiffel Tower: “This recording was made using a sensitive geophone originally designed for seismic measurements that has been adjusted for field recording purposes. “The geophone was attached directly on to the main structure of the Eiffel […]

In January 2020 we attended the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. For one week every year, this high-end ski resort in the Swiss Alps transforms from a peaceful haven in the mountains to the global focus, as world and business leaders descend on the town in private jets and helicopters to discuss the biggest […]

Join us in Tamil Nadu, India today, to hear this gorgeous field recording by Gianni Siccardi, who noted while recording the Puja in a Ramana ashram that “I was fascinated by the sound of bells and by the connections with bells in western churches.” City version: Mark Taylor has reimagined the bell sound with a […]

Today we’re ringing in the new year! The traditional morning bells ring out across every town in Italy on New Year’s Day, as every individual campanile chimes in its own distinctive way, as recognisable and unique as a fingerprint, or the lines on the back of a hand to the citizens of every town and […]

As part of our #StayHomeSounds project, we’ve been collecting and also reimagining the sounds of the global lockdown – today we’re visiting Milan, Italy at the height of the lockdown in March 2020, with a brand new composition inspired by the “stay at home” messages being broadcast in neighbourhoods across the city. The original field […]

An unusual field recording for you today, as we tune into a pagan ritual taking place at an ancient monument in rural England. Upon visiting an ancient historical site more than 5,000 years old in Oxfordshire, the Rollright Stones, we stumbled across a pagan May ritual being performed. The site consists of the evocatively-named King’s […]

A rare treat for you today, with the opportunity to listen in to an authentic geiko performance from Kyoto, Japan, as recorded by Giulia Biasibetti. “As a Westerner, it is rare to see a performance by authentic Kyoto Geiko as only a few groups remain who still train and perform traditionally – so it was […]

Join us in Ben Arous, Tunisia today, for this soundwalk recorded by Mohsen Ben Hadj Salem, who notes it as “a soundwalk in the courtyards and plots of my residence, spying on neighbours by walking slowly to next to their windows.” City version: “In the original field recording, we’re following a soundwalk around a local […]

None of us are able to do much travelling at the moment, so for the last few weeks we’ve been releasing a series of free albums showcasing some of our favourite reimagined sounds and field recordings from all over the world. Today we’re proud to launch two albums for your enjoyment – Sounds from Germany […]

During lockdown, we’ve all been noticing the sounds of nature that little bit more – and even in the centre of our cities, we can hear more (and different) birdsong that we could before the coronavirus pandemic. This recording is one case in point from the centre of Florence, Italy, as described by local resident […]

During the coronavirus lockdown, cities have been sounding very different – almost humming with the pulse of their own electricity beneath the eerie silence. Here’s one such story from our home city of Oxford, and a new piece reflecting on the changing soundscapes of locked-down cities. “The Bodleian Libraries are one of the most famous […]

This famous photograph of Walt Whitman in Camden, New Jersey is held at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden Collection, and dates from around 1891 – now Nick St. George has brought the famous poet to life in sound using this photo as inspiration, as he explains: “Walt Whitman was a fascinating character. Probably gay […]

Join us at the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery, where we’re examining this painting of Thomas Edison as part of our Smithsonian Treasures project. Painted during Thomas Alva Edison’s visit to Paris for the Universal Exposition of 1889, Abraham A. Anderson’s portrait depicts the wealthy entrepreneur at the height of his career. World-renowned for his inventions-including […]

Abraham Lincoln, a self-educated frontier lawyer from Illinois, faced one of the greatest challenges as president: preserving the Union. He initially framed the Civil War as a Constitutional crisis over secession, but as fighting intensified, his aims evolved to include reunification based on the abolition of slavery. In 1865, when the war ended, he proposed […]

This is no ordinary microphone. This particular microphone, from the Smithsonian’s collection, was used by Rakim to record the album “The 18th Letter” (1997). The hand-held microphone has a circular silver mesh wire grill covering the foam interior of the microphone. The grill is attached to a black plastic cylindrical handle with text printed in […]

Today we pay a trip to the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington DC as part of our Smithsonian Treasures project – the item we’re examining deals with issues of race, identity and slavery. The item is a first edition of the book Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral, by […]

Hope you’re all safe and well and getting through lockdown, wherever you are in the world. It’s tricky to travel the world right now, so we’ve put together a special selection of some of our most fascinating field recordings for you to remix and reimagine. Are you up for taking on the global remix challenge? […]

On 9 June 2020, following two weeks of global Black Lives Matters protests, and following the toppling of a statue of slave trader Edward Colston in Bristol, UK, more than a thousand protesters gathered in Oxford city centre for Rhodes Must Fall, to demand the removal of a statue of the colonialist Cecil Rhodes from […]

Taking a tour of our Smithsonian Treasures exhibition, let’s stop to admire this sculpture of The Death of Cleopatra. As the catalogue entry reads, “Cleopatra (69 – 30 BCE), the legendary queen of Egypt from 51 to 30 BCE, is often best known for her dramatic suicide, allegedly from the fatal bite of a poisonous […]

We’re super-proud to unveil our latest project, which we’ve been working on since way before the world turned itself upside-down… we really hope you enjoy it! Smithsonian Treasures is an online sound exhibition inspired by the works of the most famous museum network in the world.  Artists all over the world took inspiration from paintings, […]

We're excited to say that our #StayHomeSounds project to map the sounds of the world's Covid-19 lockdown has now moved onto its second phase. Artists all over the world are remixing and reimagining the sounds of the lockdown, to bring their own thoughts, feelings, creativity and skills to these unique recordings. The project will be [...]

In a time of global pandemic, prayer is absolutely as important as ever, but some of the habits and rituals surrounding prayer are having to change – and so are their soundscapes. As you can hear in this recording from Chennai, India recorded by Sathya Tamizharasan, “amidst the chaos on the streets during this Covid-19 lockdown, […]

Bees drone – everyone knows that. And they drone at a pretty similar frequency level to that dull background hum of traffic noise and industry in our cities, which means outside the buzzing in your garden or a park, you rarely hear them in action. During the lockdown, with traffic at its lowest point since, […]

Here in the UK during the current coronavirus lockdown (as of early May 2020), we’re allowed to go out for one form of exercise per day. As part of my prescribed exercise, I’ve stopped in a few places around our city of Oxford to capture how it sounds in this unique moment, in which everything […]

One of the things we’ve noticed while following the changing soundscapes of the Covid-19 lockdown over the past couple of months is the tonal shift away towards some sounds of protest, unrest and discontent as the lockdown drags on, and people in some countries become disillusioned with the ways in which their government is responding. […]

Today we’re proud to release #StayHomeSounds Volume 1, an album of some of the most fascinating recordings from the global coronavirus lockdown. All proceeds from the release will go directly to the WHO’s coronavirus relief fund, so please do support if you can! The album covers 20 recordings from 16 countries, with sounds as diverse […]

The fantastic Resonance FM in the UK have broadcast two special hour-long shows about our #StayHomeSounds project – and you can listen to both of them here. The shows are a great introduction into the huge range of sounds we can hear around the world during the Covid-19 lockdown – and also show how the […]

Over the last few weeks, we’ve been collecting and presenting the sounds of the global coronavirus lockdown, from applause for health workers and anti-coronavirus songs to the reemergence of nature and the silence of deserted spaces. Now, we’re moving the StayHomeSounds project to its next stage – and we need your help! We’re looking for artists and […]

Tune in to Resonance FM this evening at 8pm BST for the second hour-long special on our #StayHomeSounds project, to hear some of the most fascinating sounds and stories from the global lockdown. This episode features the sounds of protest, as the tone and atmosphere around the world begin to shift, a featured sound from […]

During February 2020, the Smithsonian Institute – the world’s largest museum complex, with more than 154 million items – made 2.8 million images from its collection freely available into the public domain. Our latest open call –  Smithsonian Treasures – asks sound artists and musicians all over the world to get inspired by the Smithsonian’s collection, producing a series […]

A very special story from our #StayHomeSounds project today, with this recording of a health service worker in the UK donning protective equipment provided by Dr. Sarah Whiteside, who told us her story: “I’m a GP in a Fulham, London. General Practice is unrecognisable from what is was a month ago. We used to have […]

One of the newest – and perhaps most unexpected – sounds of the Covid-19 global lockdown is the creation of new songs about the pandemic in various places around the world. Here are two great examples from our #StayHomeSounds project. The first is an anti-coronavirus song from Senegal, as Luca Piparo describes: “”I was on […]

One of the most fascinating things to come out of our #StayHomeSounds project to record the sounds of the global Covid-19 lockdown has been to compare some of the world’s bustling, busy cities as they are today with how they were just a few short weeks ago. The differences between the sounds tell the story […]

Last week, the UK followed in the footsteps of many other countries by suggesting a show of appreciation and respect for its NHS healthcare workers in public at 8pm. Unlike other countries, this has not become a daily occurrence yet, but people came out in their thousands on 26 March to applaud the National Health […]

Tonight (Friday 27 March) at 8.00 pm GMT, you can catch a one-hour special on our #StayHomeSounds project on Resonance FM – tune in over here. Travelling from Argentina to Australia, via the USA, India, Senegal and Finland, you’ll hear everything from tributes to health workers and anti-coronavirus songs to dawn choruses and deserted cities. […]

Our #StayHomeSounds project visits one of the world’s most famous urban tourist attractions, New York’s Times Square, with this fascinating lockdown recording by Geoff Gersh. “Times Square is usually bustling with activity, day and night. Tourists, street performers, food vendors, the homeless, taxis, delivery trucks, etc etc all make up the cacophonous chorus that the […]

Our #StayHomeSounds project is charting the sounds and stories from the global coronavirus lockdown – there have been some incredible stories coming through already, so we’re going to share one every day with you. We start in Peru, with Cesar Callirgos, who writes: “I am in Lima, Peru and we are in a 15-day lockdown. […]

As we all know, the world is a very different place right now, with countless communities and countries around the world entering lockdown and social distancing to combat the Covid-19 pandemic. We know that – along with sounds – everyone has their own story to tell. We’d like to invite all of you, wherever you […]

In these strange and unsettling times all over the world, we all need a little something to brighten up our day, however small it might be. Today we’re releasing a special new album Sounds for Lifting Hearts ❤️, a compilation of some the most beautiful recordings from Cities and Memory. Please download it for free, share it […]

Pellestrina is an idyllic, unspoilt little island in the south of the Venetian lagoon, much less frequented by tourists than the likes of Lido or Murano. Here we’re sitting on harbour side of this unusually long, thin island, enjoying an unspoilt and peaceful view that’s only interrupted by the roaring of passing speedboats and motorboats […]

A trip to the exotic Turks & Caicos Islands today, with a peaceful recording by Marcel Gnauk, as the ocean breaks on the beach at sunrise at Whitby on North Caicos. City version: You can’t hear the sunrise in this recording, but I’m sure a finely-tuned ear from the Turks & Caicos could identify these […]

An early morning trip to the Black Lake in Montenegro today, as Mark Wilden was lucky enough to capture the sound of a choir singing on the shore of the lake – as an added bonus, here’s a brief video clip of what he recorded: City version: For the reimagined sound, I tried several routes […]

We’re delighted to announce that we’ll be performing a special composition at this year’s Audiograft festival, the leading event for experimental music and sound in Oxfordshire. Our commissioned piece is called “Sedimento”, and it’s a sonic response to Pauline Oliveros’ reflection in the introduction to Deep Listening about life, relationships and sonic experiences: “we are […]

Come with us to the Paris Latin Quarter (and check out more sounds from Paris over here), as we visit Saint-Séverin, a 13th-century Gothic Catholic church in the heart of this historic district. The bells are ringing out on a Sunday morning for mass, reverberating off the cobbled streets of this beautiful part of the […]

We’re back on the New York subway today, on a journey from 72nd Street – in this recording, you can hear one train leaving as we remain on the platform to catch the second arrival. Once on board the train, we hear the distinctive beeps of doors closing, and the general chatter in the carriage […]

Today is Brexit day – the day that the UK leaves the European Union, much to the sadness and regret of a significant part of the British people, myself included. Over the past three years, Brexit has been part of the fabric of British life, bringing in more rancour, ill feeling and division than anything […]

One of our favourite field recordings from a recent trip to New York, this is a slice of Chinatown condensed into one small Manhattan park. In this fascinating recording, we can hear first a man playing a Chinese string instrument solo, as he teaches his friend technique on the instrument. Next, we wander around the […]

A classic NYC sound – the sirens of a fire truck trying to get through traffic, accompanied later by a police car. The sounds of sirens are reflected across the whole of Manhattan by the vast concrete and glass surfaces of the skyscrapers, so their already-impressive sounds resonate even further and louder than they would […]

Anyone for jazz? Then come with us to Small’s jazz club in Greenwich Village, an excellent club devoted to giving space to the best young, new and upcoming jazz talent on the New York scene – here we tune into a couple of numbers from Ulysses Owen Jr.’s exceptional drum-led five-piece, as heard in October […]

After more than a month of collecting sounds from 45 countries around the world, we’re really happy to launch the open call for our latest project, Future Cities. The project will be the largest ever survey of the sounds of our cities - and we need your help to recompose, remix and reimagine these fascinating urban sounds!  [...]

The Staten Island Ferry is that strangest of things – an extremely functional public transport service route that also doubles as one of New York’s most popular tourist attractions as it’s free and it takes you past the Statue of Liberty. So the makeup of ferry travellers varies in percentage of tourists to locals depending […]

Central Park in New York is a vast space, and one that attracts so much music! On a recent trip to the city, we stumbled across a real musical party here, as a group of 20 or so people with various instruments joyously bash out some traditional sounds without a care in the world. In […]

On the New York metro, we take a trip from Roosevelt Island to Bryant Park in Manhattan. It’s a smooth, quiet journey, but there’s plenty of space to enjoy the distinctive NYC subway announcements, alternating between male and female voices, and the reverb from outside when the train is stationary on the platform with its […]

The New York steam system is iconic – known from the big screen as much as from walking around Manhattan, but fewer people know how it works, or indeed what purpose it serves. To many people, this looks like mysterious gases escaping from the subterranean world of the sewers. Weirdly alluring considering it’s just a […]

The end (of 2019) is nigh, and as such here’s our albums of the year record of the music that’s kept us dreaming over the last 12 months (and here’s last year’s review, should you be interested). Dive in, have a listen, and if you like the sound of any of it, why not head […]

This has been a big year for Cities and Memory, and for our contributors all over the world. We've taken the number of countries on our sound map up to an amazing ninety, broken the barrier of one million listens to sounds in the project, launched four brand new projects - and even Cities and [...]

It’s nearly the end of the year, so as is our tradition we’ve asked some of our regular contributors all over the world for their favourite sound tools, plugins, instruments and musical wizardry of 2019. Following on from our previous roundups of the best sound design tools of the year (for instance in 2018 and […]

Join us on the football field at a mid-table Serie B clash on a warm August evening between Cittadella and Cremonese – a drummer is stirring up the home ultras, who switch between periods of animated singing, excitable shouting to urge their team on and quieter moments. In the video clip below, you can see […]

Take a trip around the bustling souks of Essaouira, Morocco, today – in particular, come with us to the poultry souk, a dimly-lit, close little souk full of caged birds and meat shops. At the end of this walkthrough recording, if you listen closely you can hear the the somewhat unpleasant sound of a chicken […]

We’re very proud to launch the open callout for our latest major global sound project – Future Cities – in which we collect, map and reimagine the sounds of our cities. Future Cities is the largest ever survey of the sounds of urban spaces around the world, examining how the soundscapes of our cities are changing through globalisation, […]

We’re proud to launch the New York city sound map on Cities and Memory today! Our New York sound map contains some of the best-known sounds from the world’s most famous city, including: – The iconic hissing steam coming from beneath the streets of Manhattan; – The musicians and entertainers of Central Park; – Top-class […]

We’re heading to Oxford today (the Cities and Memory home city) for the annual Cowley Road carnival, a day-long street party and procession with floats, bands, live music and all the usual things you’d associate with a carnival. We went along with our recorder in hand to capture some of the atmosphere at the heart […]

Today we’re venturing into an abandoned mine to listen to some subterranean sounds of clanking chains and metal, as recorded by Marcel Gnauk. Though not particularly old, the rusted structures at these two abandoned mines stand like modern ghosts. City version: Alan Bleay has taken on the challenge of remixing these chains using their three-word […]

Next stop on our tour of the Three Words project is Florence, Italy, with this recording of the Piazza della Repubblica by Valerio Orlandini: “The city centre is full of things to see (and to listen to) packed in a small space, and it is easily crossable with a pleasant walk. “The sounds to focus […]

Essaouira is famous for the Atlantic wind that blows through it all year round – here it is on a windy spring morning on the beach, forming part of our Three Words project. City version:  This sound was reimagined by Italian band Foto di Gruppo, using the words ///populate.candy.impulse as inspiration – here they […]

It’s time to begin our tour of the Three Words project, and we begin in Moscow, Russia, at the entrance to the Arbatskaya station, where we can hear a powerful string duet serenading commuters with a pulsing, dramatic piece of music that’s well suited to the splendour of the Mosco metro. City version: Rob Knight […]

Today’s sound takes us all the way to Uganda, where this recording from Colin Hunter was made, capturing a  local Batwa family performing a traditional tribal song and dance. City version: The reimagined sound is by Millie Wissar, who writes: “We are currently facing a time when governments around the world understate the importance of […]

A fascinating sound from Africa today courtesy of Colin Hunter, who travelled to Uganda and recorded the sounds of a local Batwa family performing a traditional tribal song and dance. City version: ‘This was reimagined by Millie Wissar, who writes: “We are currently facing a time when governments around the world understate the importance of […]

Today’s field recording is from beautiful Lake Garda in Italy, as waves lap against a small wooden quay at the picturesque Punta San Vigilio viewpoint. Gentle waves crash in as a speedboat passes, which then grow along with the sounds of boatwash towards the end of the recording. Passing gulls contribute to the soundscape. City […]

The second ever Cities and Memory live show has been announced, taking place on Saturday 26 October in Oxford, UK – it will be an evening of live electronic music from Oxford and Bristol, in the intimate confines of the Port Mahon, one of our favourite music venues. You can find out more about the […]

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An unusual one today – as part of our Sounding Nature project, Cities and Memory reimagined the sound of nightingale song into a new piece called “Infinite Nightingale”. Sound artist Alex Hehir has taken the composite stems from this piece and created a reimagined version of that sound – a remix of a remix of […]

We’re excited to present the callout for the Cities and Memory summer project, which is called Three Words. It’s based on what3words, which is a unique mapping and location system whereby every 3m square in the world is assigned a unique three-word address – which means any location on the planet can be found using […]

One of the most iconic sounds of space travel is also one of the earliest – the original “beep” of Sputnik as it circled the Earth, as captured by NASA. News reports at the time pointed out that “anyone possessing a short wave receiver can hear the new Russian earth satellite as it hurtles over […]

Spooky sounds from Saturn today, courtesy of NASA. Saturn is a source of intense radio emissions, which were monitored by its Cassini spacecraft. The radio waves are closely related to the auroras near the poles of the planet – these auroras are similar to Earth’s northern and southern lights. This is a recording of radio […]

What does it sound like to descend through the atmosphere of an alien moon? This recording from the European Space Agency has the answer – a laboratory reconstruction of the sounds heard by microphones on the Huygens satellite. Several sound samples, taken at different times during the descent, are here combined together and give a […]

We’re on board the International Space Station today, with this amazing sound from the European Space Agency, who describe it like this: Ever wonder how the International Space Station alarms sounds? This emergency alert is the last thing astronauts on the ISS ever want to hear as they work 400 km above Earth in the […]

A remarkable sounds from outer space today, with the European Space Agency’s recording of ‘dawn chorus’ signals detected by their Wide Band Data instrument. Here’s how it works: high-energy electrons get trapped in the Earth’s radiation belts. When they are accelerated by the electromagnetic field, they produce this familiar sound. With the help of missions […]

We’re excited to say that our project Space is the Place featured on one of our favourite radio shows here in the UK, the groundbreaking Late Junction on BBC Radio 3. As well as discussing Space is the Place in more detail, Late Junction played out two contributions to the project as part of their […]

Here’s one sound that needs no introduction – possibly the most famous radio broadcast of all time, as Neil Armstrong sets foot on the Moon to declare “one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind”. The raw facts are as follows: On July 20, 1969, the Apollo 11 crew successfully completed the national […]

Today marks the 50th anniversary of the launch of the Apollo 11 mission to the Moon – truly an incredible moment in human history. To celebrate that occasion, let us tell that story through sound. First, the original field recording from NASA – here are the facts: On July 20, 1969, the Apollo 11 crew […]

We were very happy to be interviewed by The World At One on BBC Radio 4 today, talking to them about our Space is the Place project. The show also played a segment from our reimagined piece “The Electromagnetic Chorus”, which is made from a recording of the “dawn chorus” in space – you can […]

We're delighted to say that our latest global project launches on Monday 1 July, and it takes us off the face of the planet! Space is the Place is a unique collection of the sounds of space and space travel, created to mark the 50th anniversary of the Moon landings in July 2019. The project [...]

Rain sounds are one of the commonest – and for some people one of the most relaxing and satisfying – field recordings, and different rainstorms in different places (and at different times) have their own distinct character. Rain sounds in one part of the world are very different from another place. Here we’re travelling to […]

Birdsong is often one of the most inspiring field recordings for Cities and Memory artists to use as source material, and the birds of Yellowstone were no exception. Come with us on a tour of the chirping birds of Yellowstone, as we reimagine the sounds of bluebirds, cranes, loons and killdeer. First up, listen for […]

This Fajr call to prayer sound is one of my all-time favourite field recordings – well worth getting up before dawn to record! From the top of our riad in Essaouira, Morocco, you could hear two calls to prayer simultaneously from different sides – one a melodic song, the other more spoken and rhythmic in […]

Why are we increasingly having the same mediated tourism experiences, wherever we go in the world – and are review sites like Tripadvisor to blame? Bremen, Germany – on the hour in a beautiful backstreet of the old city, the Haus des Glockenspiels offers a display of 20 porcelain bells performing a nine-minute sound display. […]

Castle Geyser is one of the major geysers of Yellowstone Park, so named in 1870 for the cone-like deposits that have built up into the form of a castle. A major eruption of Castle Geyser can last for more than an hour, moving from shooting hot water up to a height of 27 metes, followed […]

Can YOU help us reimagine a famous tourist attraction in Bremen, Germany? For our reimagined version of the amazing Glockenspiel House, we’re focusing on its status as a major tourist attraction, and looking at how online reviews are shaping our memory and experience of cities. Just take five minutes to record yourself reading out one […]

Come with us to Perm, Russia, where you join us standing outside the Perm opera house in this recording by Mark Wilden, listening in through an open window on an opera singer practising for her next show. City version: Sometimes when you listen to an opera singer, you feel like their voice is capable of […]

Today’s sound comes from Yellowstone National Park via the National Park Service – here you can hear the harsh cries of red-winged blackbirds reverberate across Swan Lake lake amidst the sounds of boreal chorus frogs and sandhill cranes. City version: The reimagined version of this sounds was composed by regular contributor Jeff Dungfelder, who writes: […]

What are fumaroles, and what do they sound like? Fumaroles come in all shapes and sizes, but broadly speaking they’re openings in the ground that emit steam and gases – for example carbon dioxide or sulphur dioxide. Yellowstone Park is one place where you can find these natural phenomena, and in this recording from the […]

Hanoi, Vietnam, and the sound of church bells at St.Joseph’s Cathedral (Vietnamese: Nhà thờ Lớn Hà Nội) – the field recording was taken at 5.30pm from a nearby balcony by Nhung Nguyen. City version: “Church bells were the internet of the 1500s, but churches didn’t play them twenty-four hours a day. Back then they knew […]

Did you know you can get all the latest Cities and Memory sounds as a podcast as soon as they’re published? In podcast format, it’s a beautiful trip around the world in field recordings and reimagined sounds that will take you on a journey alongside all your other podcast listening. Each sound is a bite-size […]

A beautiful sound from Yellowstone National Park for you to enjoy today, as an American dipper sings along with some honking Canada geese in a quiet moment along the Firehole River. City version: The reimagined sound is a beautiful piece that reflects the serenity of the original recording, by Stefanie Merchak: “Birds singing give me […]

What could be more emblematic of the great American national parks than the sound of a grizzly bear? In this recording, the National Park Service write: “Grizzly bears sometimes vocalize when agitated or nervous. These sounds of huffing, jaw-popping (heard at :35 and :57 seconds in), and low growls are warnings that you’re too close. […]

Our Yellowstone project features some incredible animal sounds, among the the atmospheric and beautiful crepuscular howling of wolves in the forests. In the original recording by the National Park Service, a pack of wolves howl during the evening while near an elk kill at Soda Butte in Yellowstone Park. If you listen closely, you can […]

We have a treat for you to end this week this Friday – our album of highlights from the Yellowstone project is available now! Containing reimagined sounds of grizzly bears, wolves and geysers, it covers everything from basslines made from growls, ambient soundscapes built from birdsong and the howling of coyotes blending with synth lines. […]

On a sonic tour of Yellowstone National Park, where better to start than Geyser Hill, the heart of the world’s greatest concentration of geysers? In this binaural recording from the National Park Service, we can hear a water outflow on Geyser Hill trickles as it passes underneath the boardwalk – a relaxing start to our […]

Today we’re proud to launch our latest global sound project, as we unveil a sound map of the world’s most famous national park, Yellowstone. The sounds of everything from grizzly bears and coyotes through to the park’s iconic geysers and steam vents have been reimagined by artists from all over the world, creating an alternative […]

On Cities and Memory you can hear the beautiful sound of a call to prayer from places including Morocco, Bangladesh and Saudi Arabia – with some beautiful reimagined versions. This is another call to prayer from Saudi Arabia, this time outside a mosque in central Riyadh. Here, the muezzin’s call to prayer is unusually stop-start, […]

Castel Sant’Angelo is one of my favourite spots in Rome – a beautiful fortress with a fascinating history that dominates this stretch of the Tiber in the city. The stretch on the bridge leading up to Castel Sant’Angelo, however, is a real tourist trap, lined with buskers, artists, trinket sellers and selfie-taking tourists sometimes in […]

Join us in the largest political protest in modern British history today (with apparently one million attendees), as we rejoin the People’s Vote march of 23 March 2019 in London. Here, a bagpipe player performs the EU anthem “Ode to Joy” while fellow protesters join in – following applause at the end, a chorus demanding […]

On Saturday 23 March, more than a million people – including Cities and Memory – marched through the streets of London to protest against the government’s handling of Britain’s exit from the European Union, and to demand a fresh vote be put to the people, called the People’s Vote march. As well as being there […]

Take a stroll with us through Piazza Navona, one of Rome’s most famous locations, a bustling and important public space for centuries. As well as sculptural marvels like Bernini’s Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi, the piazza has been a hugely important architectural and artistic space since the 1600s. And as you might expect from such a […]

We’re excited to add the 86th country to our global sound map with this chaotic street recording from Jamaica by DJ Afifa, who writes: “Cross Roads is a major town centre between Half Way Tree and Downtown in Kingston Jamaica. I am standing at the bus stop at Crossroads waiting for a bus going to […]

It’s time to celebrate, with fireworks sounds from New Year’s Eve. Join us for a huge fireworks display held in Prato della Valle in Padova, Italy – the largest square in Italy, and one of the largest in Europe. It’s midnight on New Year’s Eve 2018, and we enjoy an extensive display of various fireworks, […]

To celebrate our Sounding Nature project, mapping the sounds of our natural environment, we’ve created a sound quiz using some of the sounds from the project. Do you know your animal sounds from your bird calls? Test your listening skills – just press “play” on each of the sounds in the quiz, and tell us […]

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The latest excerpt from our Sounding Nature project is an examination of the urban sounds of nature, taken from Central Park in New York City. Hundreds of starlings argue, fight and feed in this world-famous park, but their calls have to compete with an incredible amount of urban noise – this recording demonstrates just how. […]

There’s a powerful story behind today’s fur seal sound from Cape Cross, Namibia, as told by recordist Daan Hendricks for our Sounding Nature project: “There is a great sadness to the context of these sounds, and it is somehow fittingly expressed by their whimpers, weeps and growls, seemingly conveying both sorrow and aggression. “There is […]

Paris, France – a trip from Gare de Port-Royal in Paris, a station on the border between its 5th and 6th arrondisements. Standing beneath a large clock, the relentless ticking is punctuated by the coming and going of trains. The reimagined sound by Karhide takes the field recording as its source material but twists it […]

Essaouira, Morocco at sunset. Listening to the Atlantic waves crashing in as we sit close to the fortress in the port, the Sqala du Port in this great trade city sitting at the crossroads of different civilisations. Here’s a short video clip of this recording being made to give you something of the atmosphere: City […]

Come with us to Moscow on a bright, chilly afternoon. Stand by the banks of the River Moskva, under the shadow of the colossal Church of Christ the Saviour. Hear the eerie, disembodied automated announcements coming from the ticket booth for the river cruises, accompanied by fake birdsong and ship’s bells. City version: The reimagined […]

We’re really happy to announce that this year Cities and Memory will be performing live for the first time – and our first live show has just been confirmed for Thursday 21 March in Oxford, UK. Excitingly, we’ll be opening up for Can legend Damo Suzuki, as he returns to Oxford with his “never-ending tour”, […]

The sonic beauty of a dawn chorus – dawn after heavy rainfall on common land with scrub. Here, the dawn chorus is at its peak: chiffchaffs, a nightingale, blackbird, lesser whitethroats, a cuckoo, willow warbler and blackcap, pheasants, a woodpigeon, a carrion crow, song thrush and a distant cockerel. This was recorded on Lydlinch Common, […]

We’re really happy that BBC Radio 3’s flagship experimental music show, Late Junction, ran a piece about our Sounding Nature project this week. Broadcast on Wednesday 9 January, the piece features a field recording of a Croatian water blowhole by Tim Shaw, and our reimagined version of that sound, as well as talking about the […]

We’re off to Borneo, Indonesia today for an encounter with flying squirrels, courtesy of this recording by John Roach, who describes the recording like this: “This is a recording in the early evening at Danum Valley in Sabah in Borneo – Danum is a relatively undisturbed lowland dipterocarp forest. “The recorder (a Zoom H2n) was […]

Continuing our summary of the Sounding Nature project, join us today at dawn in the Djoudj National Bird Sanctuary in Senegal. Listen to the unforgettable sound of African fish eagles carries over the water, accompanied by other bird calls, distant pelican croaks and water movement, recorded by George Vlad. The reimagined sound is a reflection […]

Wow, 2018 has been great for music! From drones to clangs to lush electronics, here’s our annual review of the albums that have kept us coming back for more throughout the year.   17. Adrian Utley & Will Gregory – Arcadia A wonderful slice of modern hauntology from the Portishead chap and the Moog maestro, […]

It's been a huge year for Cities and Memory, with four sound projects launched, our new series of city guides, the total number of countries on the sound map now up to an amazing 85 and even a trip to Russia! Here's a rundown of our 2018: Sounds in the project Countries on the sound [...]

As is our Christmas tradition, every year we present a guide to the best sound design tools and production tools that our artists around the world have been taking inspiration from to create a world of sound in 2018. Following on from our previous editions (read the lists from 2017, 2016 and 2015), here are […]

The best field recordings of 2018 Field recordings are the lifeblood of Cities and Memory, and our sound map now covers more than 80 countries with every possible type of sound recording. At this time of year, we look back on the previous 12 months, and ask some of our contributors to tell us about […]

A remarkable sound today, as we hear Hurricane Harvey close up and personal with this recording by Timothy Grieve-Carlson, who writes: “On the evening of Saturday, August 26, 2017, Hurricane Harvey brought a wave of strong thunderstorms into Houston before it eventually settled over the city for days of rain. “As the thunder intensified, I […]

When night falls in Niokolo Koba, the baboons start arguing over the best spots in the trees – as you can hear in this fantastic recording by George Vlad. This was reimagined by Ricky Milano, who created a full electronica track from the sounds of these amazing animals: “When I first heard the sound, it […]

Wander through the cornfields of Connecticut, USA, with today’s soundscape from Michael Gatonska. Sound artist Marco Colocci has reimagined the sound, and he invites us on a journey of imagination: “I close my eyes and I’m lying in a cornfield. Through the senses I can perceive a world made of sounds, sounds that tell stories, […]

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 […]

We begin our tour of some of the sounds of nature with this piece, broadcast on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme in late November 2018 to promote the launch of the Sounding Nature project. The original sound is nightingale song recorded by Phil Riddett in Hemsted Forest, Kent on 27th April 2008. The nightingale is […]

We’re proud to release not one but two new albums as companion pieces to our latest project Sounding Nature. Each of them compiles some of the highlights of the project, and is available as a free/pay-what-you-like download. The first is a genuinely-beautiful collection of some of the best reimagined and recomposed pieces from the project, […]

Since our launch on Monday, Sounding Nature has had some major news coverage, including several BBC radio and TV interviews. The first was on BBC Radio 4’s flagship news programme Today. Tune in to some of the interviews below: BBC Radio 4 – Today BBC World Service BBC London Radio BBC London TV

We’re proud to launch our biggest ever sound project today, after months of work and sounds sent in by artists from all over the world. Sounding Nature is a global sound map of nature covering 55 countries across six continents, featuring almost 500 sounds in total, covering everything from hippos, hyenas and eagles to geysers, […]

We have a rare treat today – sounds from inside the facilities of the famous European Centre for Nuclear Research, CERN, provided by Cities and Memory contributor Andy Gillham, who describes his visit: “This is an amalgamation of recordings made entirely within the facilities of CERN on the Franco-Swiss border near Geneva. “Alongside a standard […]

Let’s head to the centre of Moscow, Russia today – listen to a singer on the steps of the 1812 Museum singing traditional folk songs on a warm night (recorded on a mobile phone). A competing saxophone busker outside Ploshchad Revolyutsii station can be heard in the background, competing with these beautiful songs with something […]

Il Pianista FuoriPosto is a travelling pianist, who takes his grand piano all over the Veneto region in Italy, popping up in surprising places to perform for the public. He doesn’t advertise where or when he’ll appear, so it’s a stroke of fortune to come across him and hear his wonderful music, as we did […]

Today we’re visiting one of the most famous sporting venues in Europe, the San Siro stadium in Milan, Italy. This recording was taken during Inter Milan vs. Lazio in December 2017, a freezing night inside this incredible impressive “cathedral of football”, close to an 80,000 sellout. The most striking sonic aspect is the coordination of […]

After a month of collecting amazing nature sounds from around the world, our biggest ever global project is ready to go – and we need you to take part in it! Sounding Nature is the first global examination of the sounds of nature, and how they are being impacted by mankind, technology and climate change. We have […]

Here’s the first of the reimagined sounds from our recent trip to Moscow to speak at the Moscow Urban Forum – on the platform of the beautiful Ploshchad Revolyutsii (Revolution Square) metro station, listening to the trains arriving and leaving. The Moscow metro is one of the city’s most incredible features, with every station being […]

The Trevi Fountain in Rome is certainly the best-known fountain in the world, and possibly one of the planet’s most famous tourist attractions – we all know what it looks like, but what does it sound like? As most visitors know, the Trevi is surrounded by (literally) thousands of tourists at almost any time of […]

We’re delighted to announce that Cities and Memory is part of the incredible Metaphonics release on one of our favourite record labels, Temporary Residence. The release is an incredible anthology of music and sounds based on the field recordings of Stuart Hyatt, comprising seven LPs and an accompanying book, and featuring musicians including Eluvium, Dan […]

Come with us to Saudi Arabia today, as we explore the stunning sights of The Edge of the World, a striking feature in the desert an hour and a half outside Riyadh. The land ends abruptly, dropping off in a huge ridge of 400-metre sheer-drop cliffs as far as you can see, with a few that […]

Sounds from the natural world are being sent in by the dozen for our forthcoming Sounding Nature project – but while every other continent is represented, we are currently lacking in sounds from Africa. Do you have any sounds of nature or the natural world from Africa that could be contributed to the project? We’re […]

We’re very proud to launch the open callout for our latest major global sound project –Sounding Nature – in which we collect, map and reimagine the sounds of nature. You can find out more about the project here. Sounding Nature is the first worldwide artistic reflection on our natural environment, as artists all over the globe reimagine […]

It’s long been a conviction of ours at Cities and Memory that sound is hugely neglected in the field of tourism, and that trips to amazing places shouldn’t just be about sightseeing, but also about “sound-hearing”. Yet when you search for “things to do in XXX” or “top attractions in XXX”, while you will of […]

We’re happy to say that we’ve expanded our Ambient Sounds collection to include a beautiful meditation on the jungle sounds of Thailand courtesy of Marcel Gnauk from Free To Use Sounds. Immerse yourself in 30 minutes of gorgeous jungle ambience, or switch to rainstorms, wave sounds, church bells or birdsong in our ambient sounds player […]

This one was a lot of fun to make – first of all, we took a field recording of howler monkeys in Costa Rica by Marcel Gnauk, who wrote: “I looked out of our apartment window and only two meters from me, I saw a howler monkey family with over 10 monkeys sitting and eating […]

A remarkable recording today from Marcel Gnauk, who captured the sounds of hundreds of birds singing on power lines in Chiang Mai, Thailand. He writes: “I am not sure how many birds but at least a few hundreds are sitting on the powerlines and chirping extremely loudly. I remember a few months ago recording sounds […]

We’re delighted to announce that Cities and Memory will be speaking at the Moscow Urban Forum in Russia next week (17-18 July). We’ll be taking part in a panel discussion entitled “Memory Space. Who and What Should the City Remember?” The session will tackle questions such as “what should the city remember?”, “in what ways […]

Today’s sound, recorded by Kim Laugs, demonstrates the aural chaos of a protest in Tahrir Square in Cairo, Egypt – the site of a large number of important and substantial protests over recent years in particular. Multiple voices jump out from all sides, some amplified by megaphones, some chanting songs, others exhorting the crowd to […]

The call to prayer is one of the most beautiful “man-made” sounds in the world, and we can never tire of hearing and recording it. There are some great examples of Cities and Memory already, including calls to prayer from Meknes in Morocco, Bangladesh, Jerusalem, Tirana and New Delhi. Today’s sound comes from the Diplomatic […]

We’re delighted to release our latest sound project today, called Cities and Memory: Ambient Sounds. It’s an interactive player that collects some of the most beautiful field recordings from our worldwide database to present a series of sounds collages for you to enjoy as you work, read or go about your day. The collection contains […]

We’re happy to launch a new project today – Sri Lanka Sounds is a collaboration with field recordist Stephane Marin of Espaces Sonores, who provided us with this excellent collection of recordings from the country, covering everything from early morning dawn chorus soundscapes to hydrophone recordings of underwater shrimp. We sent these recordings out to musicians and sound […]

We visited Burkittsville, Maryland – the setting of The Blair Witch Project – on a horror movie pilgrimage, and a eerie fog descended over the town almost exactly as we arrived. From the cemetery in the town, this created a really spooky atmosphere leading to a series of black and white photographs making Burkittsville look like […]

A stunning image by Alexandros Kantoros taken in Thessaloniki, Greece of migrating swallows: “Late autumn, swallows gathering all together in a flock, near the edge of the city, before they migrate south. They would gather in an hour or less, before they all decided to fly in a go. While gathering, they all would sit […]

Today’s photography is from a beach in Dakar, Senegal, as the sun sets and birds wheel overhead, searching for remnants of food from the detritus left behind at the end of the day. The image inspired Oxford musician Kid Kin to create a new piece titled “The Early Bird”: “The image of birds circling the […]

Today’s photograph depicts pollarded willows stand in the flooded land at Tealham Moor, in Somerset, UK, taken by Frances Annear, who writes: “Pollarding is an ancient custom to provide fodder for animals or fire wood. The moors around Wedmore had willow trees planted to mark tracks across the land, so that when the land flooded […]

Today’s photograph is a jellyfish floating serenely yet menacingly past an observation window at the National Aquarium in Baltimore, which was transformed into this gorgeous, spacey piece by Luis Pinto: “I began composing this piece immediately after I looked at the image, without searching for any information about jellyfish. “The picture instantly triggers some kind […]

Today’s photograph, taken by Lauren Pond, is from the 2014 Eddie Adams Workshop, an annual gathering of photojournalists in upstate New York, at which participants released balloons in memory of colleagues who have died. Rob Knight was inspired by this image, and created the corresponding sound piece “Caesium”: “I spent a long time looking and […]

Today’s image is from an abandoned nightclub in Toronto, by Richelle Forsey: “This is a photo inside the decommissioned and semi demolished nightclub ‘Atlantis’, on Toronto, Ontario’s waterfront, on the coldest January 1rst (2018) on record. I document abandoned spaces, seeking to uncover the energy these spaces resonate with post occupation.” The photograph has been […]

Next up in our Sound Photography rundown is this photograph taken on Flat Holm Island, in Cardiff Bay. The sun was setting to the west with a glorious golden evening light, while to the east the rapidly-changing weather was bringing in dark storm clouds. The effect was to light up the lighthouse, as if it […]

Today’s striking image by Lauren Pond is of a trucker chapel in Ohio, USA – she writes: “Truck driver Ben Blackburn participates in Bible study at a mobile chapel at the Lodi, Ohio TA Travel Center in October 2013. Transport For Christ, an international trucking ministry, has placed dozens of these chapels at truck stops […]

Today’s photograph and sound pairing are from northern England, with this stunning image of the Drax power station by Alan Silvester, with a sonic composition designed around the image by Stephanie Merchak, who writes:” “The photo of the Drax coal power station, one of the most polluting power stations in the UK, automatically made me […]

Our Sound Photography project has now launched and is available to explore in full, so we’ll profile selected photographs and sound pieces on the site over the coming weeks. If you’ll permit the indulgence, we’re beginning with a photograph and image pair created by Cities and Memory, with this image from our home city of […]

Take a trip with us today to Bali, Indonesia and hear bat sounds at the Goa Lawah Temple, as recorded by Marcel Gnauk: “I was standing in front of the cave and couldn’t believe it, Thousands of bats sleeping, squeaking or flying around the cave! In the back of the cave is another room with […]

The Sistine Chapel is obviously one of the most famous places on Earth, containing one of its best-known works of art – as such, it’s a visual icon, but little is spoken of its sounds. The sonic experience is unexpected and fascinating – every five minutes or so, a warden speaks through a PA system […]

Following on from our recent post about why Venice is the best city for field recording, here’s our latest sound from the city. We ventured out to its furthest island, Torcello, to explore a more rural and peaceful side to Venice – upon our return, we recorded the sound of the clanging vaporetto dock as […]

We’ve been pondering the unanswerable question lately - “what’s the best place in the world for field recording?” Of course, it depends on so many things - not least personal subjective opinion - but we’re always fascinated to hear about people’s favourite sounds, and favourite sound locations, so we decided to write a few words [...]

We’re looking for sound artists to help us reimagine and recompose the sounds of Sri Lanka. Thanks to Stéphane Marin (Espaces Sonores), we have an amazing collection of field recordings from Sri Lanka. Ranging from calls to prayer and temple musicians to recordings of monkeys, insects, dawn choruses and shrimps underwater, the sounds reveal the very […]

What are the best places on Earth for field recording? For an upcoming Cities and Memory feature, we invite you to tell us a little bit about your favourite place for field recording – whether it’s a city or town, a rural spot, a piece of coastline or some other secret space that sounds incredible […]

A trip to the streets of Vietnam today, with this great recording of an old wire drawing machine, courtesy of Marcel Gnauk, who runs the excellent resource Free To Use Sounds. He writes: “The machine is so loud that you can barely hear the street traffic. On the left side is the “endless” wire and […]

An unusual sound for you today, as we hear the crunch of salt crystals underfoot, trekking across the Salar de Uyuni salt flats in Bolivia, in this recording by Mark Wilden.  Andy Lyon created this excellent reimagined version, and writes: “Salar De Unuyi is the world’s largest salt flat. It conjures up an image of a […]

A familiar location for travellers today – the departures gate, this time at Jomo Kenyatta airport in Nairobi, recorded by Giulia Biasibetti. You can hear among the normal sounds of bustle and shopping in the terminal the crackle of the security guards’ radios and the feedback as they stand too close together, and a conversation […]

Can you help? We’re looking for recordings of people saying “thank you” in as many languages as possible, to be used in a new Cities and Memory piece entitled “Gratitude”, as part of our Sound Photography global project. All you need to do is upload a sound file of you saying “thank you” in any […]

Another trip to Japan today, with a field recording from the extraordinary ancient forests of Yakushima, Japan – a World Heritage site. This was recorded and reimagined by Andy Gillham, who writes: “The field recording features bird calls and nature recorded on a walk deep in the lush subtropical ancient forests of Yakushima. “These are […]

A real treat for lovers of unusual sounds today – a rare chance to listen to the sounds of a traditional geiko performance from Kyoto, Japan, courtesy of a field recording by Giulia Biasibetti. “It’s not easy to experience truly traditional geisha entertainment in Japan these days, so it was very lucky to be treated […]

The sounds of ice hockey for you today, with a field recording from a recent match we attended in Nottingham. Ice hockey is an interesting sonic experience, from the crunch of body checks into the barriers, the skidding of ice, the thwack of the sticks and then the frequent bursts of music at every stoppage […]

The first phase of our Sound Photography project was a great success, with 100 photographs contributed from six continents and more than 30 countries, and some really inspiring source material to work with. Now we want you to take part in our open call – by creating a sound piece based on one of these […]

A beautiful natural recording from Mesnjak Forest in Slovenia today, submitted by Martina Testen – you can hear all kinds of birdsong surrounding you as you explore the recording, including the crack of woodpecker beaks on trees. The reimagined version takes as its central thought the idea that 62% of Slovenia is is covered in […]

We paid a visit to London’s Science Museum in search of sounds – and we found them in its Broadcast Zone – an interactive gallery charting the beginnings of global broadcast. In this field recording you can hear snippets of early radio, Morse code and other communications as we tour the gallery. The reimagined version […]

We're very proud to unveil our new-look sound map today, which you can view in full on the homepage or on our sound map page. The map covers 73 countries, with almost 2,000 field recordings and reimagined sounds from around the world. As well as a new look, the map has some great new features [...]

There’s just one week left to submit your photographs to our latest global collaborative project, Sound Photography. We’re looking for striking images from anywhere in the world, which will be transformed into sound pieces in this unique collaboration between photographers and sound artists. Images must be accompanied by location info and a brief description, and […]

A sound with a literary connection today, as we visit the beautiful Italian town of Arquà Petrarca, hometown of the great poet Petrarca (that’s Petrarch to us English speakers). The field recording is of the church bells ringing in the centre of Arquà Petrarca, which is regarded as one one of the most beautiful villages […]

We’re delighted to announce our latest global collaborative project, called Sound Photography. The project examines the relationships between photography, images and sound by inviting sound artists to create a composition based on photographs submitted from around the world. Photographers will submit images from their portfolio, which will be presented to sound artists and musicians to […]

The roar of high-performing engines as we turn the world of sports today. Paul Virostek of Creative Field Recording sent through several recordings from the Toronto Indy Lights race practice – here we can hear a pack of cars zooming past during qualifying at turn 9 on the Toronto course. City version: The reimagined sound […]

An unusual field recording for you today – bat sounds recorded by Tenali Hrenak in the Dhammayan Gyi Buddhist temple in Bagan, Myanmar. City version: Pascal Savy has taken a deep dive into the location in which the bat sounds were heard to produce a dense and impressive recomposed sound: “The inspiration for this track […]

A beautiful soundscape from new contributor Biagio Laponte, who sent us this composition from the Strait of Messina in southern Italy. The original field recording is a delicate soundscape of waves breaking on the shore, with a reimagined sound based on this coming from his wider project titled Morgana”. Biagio says: “‘Morgana’ is a research work […]

Bells ring out in the evening at San Trovaso in Venice, on Christmas Eve, on an unusually quiet evening in the city – you can hear the calm in the night sky as the bells ring out. There are lots of different bells sounds on the Cities and Memory sound map, which have been reimagined […]

A wintry trip into the Dolomites of Italy today as we record a trip on a ski lift at Passo Rolle, close to San Martino di Castrozza. It’s a peaceful sound, with the swooshing of skis underneath punctuating the gentle whirr and clunk of the ski lift mechanism above – as an added bonus, here’s […]

This is perhaps my favourite field recording of 2017 – the bells of Venice ringing out spectacularly over the rooftops on Christmas Eve. Christmas in Venice is always a special time – the city is simultaneously much quieter than usual as the tourists have mostly left, but there’s still that special Christmas atmosphere everywhere you […]

2017 has been a big year for Cities and Memory - from large-scale projects about spirituality and protest to international media coverage and exhibitions, here's our roundup of the year: Sounds in the project Global contributors Sound plays Countries on the sound map 2017 project: Sacred Spaces Sacred Spaces, which launched in February 2017, was [...]

It’s been an end-of-year tradition at Cities and Memory to ask some of our most frequent contributors to tell us which are the best sound design tools, plugins, effects and instruments they’ve been using most over the previous 12 months. Following on from our roundups of the best sound design tools of 2016 and 2015, […]

Our annual review of the best albums of the year – from ambient drones to angular guitars, here are the records we kept coming back to in 2017. 15. Hidden Orchestra – Dawn Chorus Kicking off with the field recording album of the year. Dawn Chorus, as you might guess from the title, integrates field […]

We’re back in Myanmar today, courtesy of Tenali Hrenak’s excellent selection of field recordings from the country – today we can hear children playing and the sounds of chanting in Nyaung-U, transformed into a haunting new piece by Manja Ristic. City version: Manja Ristic writes of her reimagined version: “Spatial sound imagination from the perspective […]

As part of our end-of-year review for this year, we’re updating our feature on “your favourite field recordings” – and we’re looking for your recordings to make it happen. We’re asking: what’s your favourite field recording from 2017?  It can be a recording that has particular personal resonance for you, a recording which you’re especially pleased […]

Today we’re in Bremen, Germany, with one of the recordings made during our recent visit to present at the REM Festival. Here we’re in the picturesque Altstadt – the chimes of St. Petris Dom in Bremen ring out for 11 o’clock, while an accordion busker plays in the adjacent Am Markt square. Trams pass and […]

Following on from our recent call to reimagine the sounds of South America, we’ve been sent a beautiful collection of field recordings from Myanmar (Burma) by contributor Tenali Hrenak. The recordings cover everything from calls to prayer and temples to traditional games and musical instruments, street entertainment and even the sound of local bats! If you’d […]

It’s the dead of night in the village of Vanv Vieng, Laos, but there’s still plenty happening in this field recording by Mark Wilden. Crickets chirp, cockerels around the village are crowing, indicating that perhaps we’re coming up towards dawn, and every so often a vehicle rolls in and out of earshot, disrupting the peace. […]