Begin, by a country church on the hills above Harlow in Essex, and at the foot of a jovial fir tree, hushed by warm wind. It's a sunny afternoon and a blackbird is singing in the secluded churchyard of St Mary's, Gilston. Wood pigeons are sunning their wings on the old slates of the church roof. Great tits call from the long hedgerow that forms a natural boundary to the open fields beyond.
The open fields beyond. You slip into a daydream, and imagine yourself not beside vast open land, but beside a vast, and open sea. You can almost hear the waves lapping. No, not quite lapping, it's more that they're washing in. Washing in on an incoming tide, from the cool expanse of the North Sea. You're on the Blackwater estuary, listening to the waves coming in. Playfully flowing over tiny, feather light shells, that form a carpet under your warm, bare feet.
Hot noon sunshine. Eyes blurring. Rising thermals from the dense sedge grass, and a heat haze to make you think you're in a dream. Now you're on Wallasea Island, a little further down along the Essex coast. A nature reserve, and a home to wild birds and countless buzzing insects. It feels like high definition. Pristine and taught with high frequency sound. The aural evidence of an ecosystem that's being nourished with more of what it really needs to exist. Bask for a minute, in its existence. Its intense August heat, and all its life-affirming sound.
And then, to a different kind of place. A creek, along which gulls and redshank and curlews swoop and fly as they hunt for food. A place where sea water ingresses inland, to blend with rolling farmland fields and little collections of homely houses and a beach with gnarled wooden groins. This is Landermere Creek near Thorpe-le-Soken. A cool summer's day with a big sky, a day of changeable weather. Rain clouds are approaching the creek, Dark grey. Heavy. But the birds are flying headlong, all the same.
You follow the rain clouds, inland. Float over miles and miles of land, criss-crossed with rivers, and roads, and strips of woodland, and buildings and settlements. Towards, but not quite, to London. By now the clouds are out of rain, and are now, just clouds. Below is a lake, No, a collection of lakes, Darkening, but that still just about reflect the clouds. The dusk is rapidly gathering. Far below, on the ground, on the thick overgrown ground that forms one bank of a large lake-like pond known as Norman's Pond, the dark bush crickets have come out. Cricketing their sharp, precise stridulating sounds to each other. Then along comes a creature. A small mammal, of some kind. Squeaking, like a children's toy. Can it be real? Where has it come from? It comes, and goes, through the leaf litter, on its jerky, squeaky way. Perhaps the swans, out dabbling on the smooth still water, will know...
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These minute segments are taken from the following full episodes:
We're sharing these mini daydream adventures while we gather new material over the summer. Full-length episodes will return in September.
Thanks for listening to and supporting Radio Lento, a podcast for anyone who loves authentic captured quiet. Each episode is recorded by us, on locations that we find by exploring the landscape on foot, and by listening. We're independent sound recordists, helped by your >>kind donations
218 Sing dawn - the songbirds of Abney Park nature reserve
217 Upland woods in winter gales (part 2 - sleep safe)
216 Sat on the sand of East Looe beach
215 Calm within Kilminorth Woods
214 Storm over hotel peninsula
213 Sound-scenes we love from four years of Lento
212 Ear witness: innercity woodland peace
211 Nothe Fort at night - quiet swirling waves
210 Watery dell amidst trees at night (sleep safe)
209 Downstream of the old mill
208 Lone tree under windswept telegraph wires
207 Bucolic dell in upland meadows (subtle, slow, best with headphones)
206 Dawn birdsong in the leafy ravine
205 Soundscenes of a changing tide (sleep safe)
204 Rain falls on steep craggy woodland (sleep safe)
203 Dartmoor stream above waterfall gorge (part 2)
202 Upland woods in winter gales (breathe easy and *sleep safe*)
201 Out on Cooden Beach at night (part 2 - night breakers on shingle) *sleep safe*
200 Windswept night in the belfry of Rye Church
199 Moorland forest mid winter gales
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