The Soundscape

1. The Soundscape Shapes Us: Understanding Our Sonic Environment

Only a total appreciation of the acoustic environment can give us the resources for improving the orchestration of the world soundscape.

Acoustic environment matters. The sounds surrounding us profoundly influence our behavior, moods, and overall well-being. Modern humans inhabit an acoustic environment radically different from any previously known, marked by increased intensity and vulgarity. Soundscape studies seek to understand the relationship between humans and their sonic surroundings, unifying various research areas like acoustics, psychoacoustics, and noise abatement.

Noise pollution is a symptom. Noise pollution arises from a lack of careful listening and a failure to appreciate the acoustic environment. Resisting noise pollution requires a positive approach, focusing on which sounds we want to preserve, encourage, and multiply. This involves recognizing the impact of sounds on our lives and actively shaping our sonic environment.

Acoustic design is key. By understanding the physical properties of sound, its interpretation by the brain, and its impact on human behavior, we can lay the foundation for acoustic design. This interdisciplinary field brings together musicians, acousticians, psychologists, and sociologists to make intelligent recommendations for improving the world soundscape. The goal is to move beyond simply resisting noise and to actively compose a more harmonious and enriching sonic environment.

2. Keynote Sounds: The Unconscious Foundation of Our Acoustic World

Keynote sounds do not have to be listened to consciously; they are overheard but cannot be overlooked, for keynote sounds become listening habits in spite of themselves.

Background sounds matter. Keynote sounds are the ambient sounds that form the foundation of our acoustic environment. These sounds, often unnoticed, shape our listening habits and influence our behavior and moods. They are the acoustic equivalent of the "ground" in visual perception, providing context and meaning to the sounds we consciously attend to.

Geography and climate create keynotes. Keynote sounds are often determined by geography and climate, such as the sounds of water, wind, forests, plains, birds, insects, and animals. These sounds can have archetypal significance, deeply imprinting themselves on people and affecting their lifestyle. For example, the sea is the keynote sound of maritime civilizations, while ice and snow define the acoustic character of northern regions.

Keynotes shape character. The keynote sounds of a given place are important because they help to outline the character of men living among them. Even though keynote sounds may not always be heard consciously, the fact that they are ubiquitously there suggests the possibility of a deep and pervasive influence on our behavior and moods.

3. Signals and Soundmarks: Foregrounding the Important and Unique

Once a soundmark has been identified, it deserves to be protected, for soundmarks make the acoustic life of the community unique.

Signals demand attention. Signals are foreground sounds that we listen to consciously, acting as acoustic warning devices or conveying specific information. These sounds, such as bells, whistles, horns, and sirens, are organized into codes that transmit complex messages to those who can interpret them. They are the "figure" in the acoustic landscape, demanding our immediate attention.

Soundmarks define community. Soundmarks are unique community sounds that are specially regarded or noticed by the people in that community. These sounds, like landmarks, contribute to the unique acoustic identity of a place and deserve protection. Examples include:

• Geographical soundmarks: Boiling sulphur fields in New Zealand
• Historical soundmarks: The explosion of Krakatoa

Protecting soundmarks is vital. By identifying and preserving soundmarks, we can maintain the acoustic diversity and character of our communities. Soundmarks are a community sound which is unique or possesses qualities which make it specially regarded or noticed by the people in that community.

4. From Hi-Fi to Lo-Fi: The Acoustic Transformation of Civilization

In a lo-fi soundscape individual acoustic signals are obscured in an overdense population of sounds.

Hi-fi vs. Lo-fi soundscapes. A hi-fi soundscape is characterized by a favorable signal-to-noise ratio, where discrete sounds can be heard clearly due to low ambient noise. In contrast, a lo-fi soundscape is one where individual acoustic signals are obscured by an overdense population of sounds, resulting in a loss of perspective and clarity. The transition from hi-fi to lo-fi marks a significant change in the history of perception.

The city abbreviates hearing. The quiet ambiance of the hi-fi soundscape allows the listener to hear farther into the distance, just as the countryside exercises long-range viewing. The city abbreviates this facility for distant hearing (and seeing) marking one of the more important changes in the history of perception.

Modern life is lo-fi. In the lo-fi soundscape, individual acoustic signals are obscured in an overdense population of sounds. On a downtown street corner of the modern city there is no distance; there is only presence. There is cross-talk on all the channels, and in order for the most ordinary sounds to be heard they have to be increasingly amplified.

5. The Industrial Revolution: A Symphony of Progress and Pollution

The destruction of the quiet northern winter by the jamming of snow-plows and snowmobiles is one of the greatest transmogrifications of the twentieth-century soundscape...

New sounds, new problems. The Industrial Revolution introduced new metals, energy sources, and machinery, leading to a multitude of new sounds that often obscured natural and human sounds. This marked the beginning of the lo-fi soundscape, with increased noise pollution and a loss of acoustic clarity. The destruction of the quiet northern winter by the jamming of snow-plows and snowmobiles is one of the greatest transmogrifications of the twentieth-century soundscape.

Noise equals power. During the Industrial Revolution, noise became associated with power and progress. The industrialists were granted dispensation to make Noise by means of the steam engine and the blast furnace, just as previously the monks had been free to make Noise on the church bell.

The flat line in sound. The Industrial Revolution introduced the "flat line" in sound, characterized by continuous, unchanging sounds produced by machines. This contrasts with the dynamic and varied sounds of nature, creating a sense of monotony and artificiality. The flat line in sound emerges as a result of an increased desire for speed.

6. The Electric Revolution: Amplifying and Fragmenting Our Sonic Reality

Today all sounds belong to a continuous field of possibilities lying within the comprehensive dominion of music. Behold the new orchestra: the sonic universe!

Amplification and schizophonia. The Electric Revolution extended the trends of the Industrial Revolution, amplifying sounds and introducing techniques for packaging and storing them. This led to schizophonia, the splitting of sounds from their original contexts, further fragmenting our sonic reality.

The rise of the loudspeaker. The loudspeaker was also invented by an imperialist, for it responded to the desire to dominate others with one’s own sound. As the cry broadcasts distress, the loudspeaker communicates anxiety.

The new orchestra. Today all sounds belong to a continuous field of possibilities lying within the comprehensive dominion of music. Behold the new orchestra: the sonic universe! And the musicians: anyone and anything that sounds!

7. Music as a Mirror: Reflecting and Shaping Our Acoustic Perceptions

Music is of two kinds: absolute and programmatic.

Music reflects the soundscape. Music serves as a mirror, reflecting the sounds and rhythms of the environment in which it is created. By studying the evolution of music, we can gain insights into the changing aural habits and perceptions of different societies.

Absolute vs. Programmatic music. Absolute music fashions ideal soundscapes of the mind, while programmatic music imitates the environment. The rise of absolute music corresponds to a growing disenchantment with the external soundscape, leading to the creation of concert halls as sanctuaries for concentrated listening.

The hunting horn archetype. The hunting horn presents us with a sound of great semantic richness. On one level its signals provide a code which all participants understand. On another level it takes on a symbolical significance, suggesting free spaces and the natural life of the country.

8. Acoustic Design: Consciously Composing Our Sonic Future

It devolves on us now to invent a subject which we might call acoustic design, an interdiscipline in which musicians, acousticians, psychologists, sociologists and others would study the world soundscape together in order to make intelligent recommendations for its improvement.

Acoustic design is essential. Acoustic design is an interdisciplinary field that seeks to improve the world soundscape by documenting important features, noting differences and trends, collecting sounds threatened with extinction, and studying the effects of new sounds. This involves understanding the symbolism of sounds and human behavior patterns in different sonic environments.

The world as a composition. Throughout this book I am going to treat the world as a macrocosmic musical composition. This is an unusual idea but I am going to nudge it forward relentlessly.

The goal is beauty. The final question will be: is the soundscape of the world an indeterminate composition over which we have no control, or are we its composers and performers, responsible for giving it form and beauty?

9. Ear Cleaning: Reclaiming Our Auditory Awareness

For many years I have been fighting for ear cleaning in schools to eliminate audiometry in factories. Clairaudience not ear muffs.

Clairaudience is the goal. Ear cleaning involves eliminating the sludge from our ears and regaining the talent for clairaudience, or clean hearing. This requires a conscious effort to resist the constant barrage of noise and to cultivate a deeper appreciation for the sounds that truly matter.

Touch is the most personal of the senses. Hearing and touch meet where the lower frequencies of audible sound pass over to tactile vibrations (at about 20 hertz). Hearing is a way of touching at a distance and the intimacy of the first sense is fused with sociability whenever people gather together to hear something special.

Sounds that matter. Ultimately, this book is about sounds that matter. In order to reveal them it may be necessary to rage against those which don’t.

10. The Acoustic Community: Defining Ourselves Through Sound

The church bell is a centripetal sound; it attracts and unifies the community in a social sense, just as it draws man and God together.

Acoustic space defines community. The acoustic space of a sounding object is that volume of space in which the sound can be heard. The acoustic community is defined by the range of its key sounds, such as the church bell or the muezzin's call.

The church bell as a signal. The most salient sound signal in the Christian community is the church bell. In a very real sense it defines the community, for the parish is an acoustic space, circumscribed by the range of the church bell.

Reclaiming acoustic space. What is needed is a reassertion of the importance, both socially and ultimately legally, of acoustic space as a different but equally important means of measurement.

11. The Power of Silence: Finding Harmony in the Absence of Noise

All research into sound must conclude with silence…

Silence is essential. All research into sound must conclude with silence. Silence is not merely the absence of sound, but a powerful force that allows us to appreciate the sounds that truly matter.

Sacred noise and secular silence. Throughout this book we are going to discover that a certain type of noise, which we may now call Sacred Noise, was not only absent from the lists of proscripted sounds which societies from time to time drew up, but was, in fact, quite deliberately invoked as a break from the tedium of tranquility.

The goal is lyrical. Although I will at times be treating aural perception and acoustics as if they were abstractable disciplines, I do not wish to forget that the ear is but one sense receptor among many. The time has come to move out of the laboratory into the field of the living environment. Soundscape studies do this. But even they must be integrated into that wider study of the total environment in this not yet best of all possible worlds.

Last updated: April 14, 2025