Books by Bernie Krause
Voices of the Wild: Animal Songs, Human Din, and the Call to Save Natural Soundscapes (The Future Series)
A pioneer in the field of soundscape ecology explores the ways in which the voice of the natural world informs many subjects
Since 1968, Bernie Krause has traveled the world recording the sounds of remote landscapes, endangered habitats, and rare animal species. Through his organization, Wild Sanctuary, he has collected the soundscapes of more than 2,000 different habitat types, marine and terrestrial. With powerful illustrations and compelling stories, Krause provides a manifesto for the appreciation and protection of natural soundscapes. In his previous book, The Great Animal Orchestra, Krause drew readers’ attention to what Jane Goodall described as “the harmonies of nature . . . [that are being] one by one by one, snuffed out by human actions.” He now explains that the secrets hidden in the natural world’s shrinking sonic environment must be preserved, not only for our scientific understanding, but for our cultural heritage and humanity’s physical and spiritual welfare.
Krause’s narrative—supplemented by exclusive access to field recordings from the wild—draws on a compelling range of personal anecdotes, histories, and examples to document his early exploration of this field and to lay the groundwork for future generations.
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The Great Animal Orchestra: Finding the Origins of Music in the World's Wild Places
Musician and naturalist Bernie Krause is one of the world's leading experts in natural sound, and he's spent his life discovering and recording nature's rich chorus. Searching far beyond our modern world's honking horns and buzzing machinery, he has sought out the truly wild places that remain, where natural soundscapes exist virtually unchanged from when the earliest humans first inhabited the earth.
Krause shares fascinating insight into how deeply animals rely on their aural habitat to survive and the damaging effects of extraneous noise on the delicate balance between predator and prey. But natural soundscapes aren't vital only to the animal kingdom; Krause explores how the myriad voices and rhythms of the natural world formed a basis from which our own musical expression emerged.
From snapping shrimp, popping viruses, and the songs of humpback whales-whose voices, if unimpeded, could circle the earth in hours-to cracking glaciers, bubbling streams, and the roar of intense storms; from melody-singing birds to the organlike drone of wind blowing over reeds, the sounds Krause has experienced and describes are like no others. And from recording jaguars at night in the Amazon rain forest to encountering mountain gorillas in Africa's Virunga Mountains, Krause offers an intense and intensely personal narrative of the planet's deep and connected natural sounds and rhythm.
The Great Animal Orchestra is the story of one man's pursuit of natural music in its purest form, and an impassioned case for the conservation of one of our most overlooked natural resources-the music of the wild.
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Wild Soundscapes: Discovering the Voice of the Natural World
A founder of soundscape ecology offers a pioneering field guide for listening to and recording the sounds of the wild
Through his organization Wild Sanctuary, Bernie Krause has traveled the globe to hear and record the sounds of diverse natural habitats. Wild Soundscapes, first published in 2002, inspires readers to follow in Krause’s footsteps. The book enchantingly shows how to find creature symphonies (or, as Krause calls them, “biophonies”); use simple microphones to hear more; and record, mix, and create new expressions with the gathered sounds. After reading this book, readers will feel compelled to investigate a wide range of habitats and animal sounds, from the conversations of birds and howling sand dunes to singing anthills.
This rewritten and updated edition explains the newest technological advances and research, encouraging readers to understand the earth’s soundscapes in ways previously unimaginable. With links to the sounds that are discussed in the text, this accessible and engaging guide to natural soundscapes will captivate amateur naturalists, field recordists, musicians, and anyone else who wants to fully appreciate the sounds of our natural world.
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The Great Animal Orchestra A Work from the Collection of the Fondation Cartier Pour L'art Contemporain
by Bernie Krause, Hans Ulrich Obrist, Gilles Boeuf, Michel Andre
Since the 1970s, California-based bioacoustician and musician Bernie Krause (born 1938) has recorded more than 5,000 hours of natural habitats, including at least 15,000 terrestrial and marine species from all around the world. At once poetic and scientific, this sound archive reveals the musical harmony and orchestral organization of animal vocalizations. It also reveals that the great animal orchestra, increasingly threatened by human activities, now risks being reduced to total and utter silence, as today 50% of the biodiversity recorded by Krause have disappeared forever.
This book presents The Great Animal Orchestra, a work created by Krause and United Visual Artists in 2016 for the exhibition spaces of the Fondation Cartier pour l'art contemporain in Paris. It tells the story of the elaboration of this unprecedented immersive installation, from the recordings of the sounds of nature realized by Krause to their visual translation into a three-dimensional video installation by United Visual Artists. Combining aesthetics and technology, The Great Animal Orchestra simultaneously offers a sound and visual meditation on the necessity of preserving the beauty of the natural world.
Alongside contributions by Krause, Matthew Clark, Gilles Boeuf, Michel André and Hans Ulrich Obrist, the book includes the QR codes of seven recordings made by Krause in seven territories chosen for their ecological diversity and the richness of their biophony, from Canada to the Central African Republic, from the United States to Zimbabwe, from Brazil to the oceans.
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