Acoustic ecologist Gordon Hempton collects sounds from around the world. He’s recorded inside Sitka spruce logs in the Pacific Northwest, thunder in the Kalahari Desert, and dawn breaking across six continents. An attentive listener, he says silence is an endangered species on the verge of extinction. He defines real quiet as presence — not an absence of sound but an absence of noise. We take in the world through his ears.
Gordon Hempton is the founder of the One Square Inch of Silence Foundation, which recently expanded to become Quiet Parks International with the mission to “save quiet for the benefit of all life.” His books include One Square Inch of Silence: One Man’s Quest to Preserve Quiet, co-authored with John Grossmann, and Earth Is A Solar Powered Jukebox: A Complete Guide to Listening, Recording, and Sound Designing with Nature. He’s also produced more than 60 albums of vanishing natural soundscapes. His latest release is a collection of soundscapes called Global Sunrise: The Musical Sounds of Dawn. His podcast is called Sound Escapes.
This interview is edited and produced with music and other features in the On Being episode "Gordon Hempton — Silence and the Presence of Everything." Find the transcript for that show at onbeing.org.
This show originally aired May 10, 2012.
Bessel van der Kolk – How Trauma Lodges in the Body, Revisited
[Unedited] Bessel van der Kolk with Krista Tippett
Bryan Stevenson – Finding the Courage for What's Redemptive
[Unedited] Bryan Stevenson with Krista Tippett
Pádraig Ó Tuama and Marilyn Nelson – “So let us pick up the stones over which we stumble, friends, and build altars”
[Unedited] Pádraig Ó Tuama and Marilyn Nelson with Krista Tippett
Katharine Hayhoe – "Our future is still in our hands"
[Unedited] Katharine Hayhoe with Krista Tippett
Darnell Moore and dream hampton — The Future of Hope 2
Mike Rose – The Deepest Meanings of Intelligence and Vocation
[Unedited] Mike Rose with Krista Tippett
Priya Parker — Remaking Gathering: Entering the Mess, Crossing the Thresholds
[Unedited] Priya Parker with Krista Tippett
Stephen Batchelor – Finding Ease in Aloneness
[Unedited] Stephen Batchelor with Krista Tippett
Kate Bowler and Wajahat Ali — The Future of Hope
Suzanne Simard — Forests Are Wired For Wisdom
[Unedited] Suzanne Simard with Krista Tippett
Béla Fleck and Abigail Washburn – Truth, Beauty, Banjo
[Unedited] Béla Fleck & Abigail Washburn with Krista Tippett
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
The Modern West
Baseball Tonight with Buster Olney
Selected Shorts
This American Life
The Frank Skinner Show
Judge John Hodgman