Saturday November 7th, 09:02 – 09:19
205.7 o to 218.6 o
Wind S 2 (gusting 3), T 6C (feels like 6C), 50% cloud cover
In the dripping grass dew draws spiders’ webs into plain sight. Copse earth speckled bronze with fallen oak leaves two pigeons clatter-flap away.
Friday November 6th, 06:56 – 07:01
180.0o to 192.9o
Wind N 1(gusting 1), T 5C (feels like 5C), 100% cloud cover
Dew drenched grass under thick dawn fog. Follow along the fence line. Main road cars pulse by. Meadow Pipit’s flick-bounce flight off into the mist.
A walk round Contención Island Thursday November 5th, 09:48 – 09:52
64.3o to 77.1o
Wind W 3 (gusting 4), T 10C (feels like 8C), 62% cloud cover
Crossing the street a great tit’s bounce-flight. Holly bush’s red berries.
Hello. A November lockdown – lockdown-2 … lockdown-lite – and again I have the question of an artistic response. So … having spent the spring lockdown creating Contención Island (https://martinpeccles.com/other-sound-works/the-42-walks-of-contencion-island/) I now plan to walk its edge, to walk the shoreline of the island and, in so doing, to also mark the days of lockdown.
With a compass in the middle of the island, I have measured 28 equal angles and, where each cuts the island rim produces 28 stretches of coastline – all of different lengths. I will walk one each day and, over 28 days, will build a walk around the entire island.
I will walk clockwise and the order in which I walk the sections will be determined by chance – building an island across time. Again, there will be recordings in sound, poetry and line all reported in a daily blog at https://martinpeccles.com . Todays is going up soon … I hope they provide some enjoyment.
Stay safe,
Following on the placing of the sound piece into radio aporee, I have now got the text, in book form, into a remotely, socially distanced, shareable form … for a slow reading experience.
Having edited the text and prepared the book (a 250 cm concertina fold) I have been waiting the opportunity to return to the place I walked to take the photographs of the book (the first time that I have been able to do this as previously the sites of my walking and writing have been remote and visited on one off occasions). It is interesting to create a visual image of something that is intended to be negotiated in a direct and physical way – I have to make a number of decisions on behalf of the reader and the intimacy of holding and reading the book is diminished – so, a (very) different work.
As an aside, it is interesting to reflect that I did the walks just before the March lockdown and am posting this just before the November one …
I’ve just added my contribution to the Landlinks project on to radio aporee at https://aporee.org/maps/projects/landlinks
If you’ve not come across radio aporee before, its a great way to explore the “sounds of the world”. Working as another way to think about landscape and located sound I’ve used it before for walking projects – https://aporee.org/maps/projects/callanaiswk
Have a listen; I hope you enjoy it.
I am delighted to say that my work “The 42 walks of Contención Island” has been shortlisted for the Sound Walk September 2020 Awards. You can see the full shortlist here – https://walklistencreate.org/2020/10/15/sound-walk-september-2020-awards-shortlist/.
Winners and honourable mentions will be announced in an online ceremony in mid-January.
“So, here’s the idea … In the face of the containment measures we have all found ourselves in we have been allowed out of our homes for one period of exercise a day. A containment strategy is vital for the containment of the Covid-19 Pandemic, but I wanted to respond to it artistically. I also wanted to produce something that could be used by others when they weren’t, or couldn’t get, outside. From the start of the UKs lockdown, every day I walked from my house, for 20 minutes in any and all directions; I mapped my route and recorded my walking. At first when I‘d walked for about 20 minutes I stopped, for a brief rest, then return to my house. But after a while I had made Contención Island (contención is containment in Esperanto – an international name for an international pandemic). I walked until easing started. The full versions of the walks are all available at www.martinpeccles.com along with the daily poem, a mesostic, and the emerging map of the island. So … listen to the walks – imagine the island in your head, create your own walk, make your own map, enjoy. Stay safe and well in these strange times.”
You can listen to the work via ResonanceFM at 23:00, Sunday 4th October 2020 and, from Tuesday 6th October via the framework radio website, via Mixcloud, and via (Apple (and presumably others)) podcasts – links below …
ResonanceFM – https://www.resonancefm.com/programmes/558d773650000b8db200002a – broadcasts on 104.4 FM to central London, DAB to Greater London, nationally on Radioplayer and live streamed to the rest of the world
and, from (maybe) Monday 5th but definitely Tuesday 6th October,
via framework radio website and an internet browser – http://www.frameworkradio.net
via Mixcloud https://www.mixcloud.com/framework_radio/ ]
via (Apple) podcasts – https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/framework-radio/id346641201
International Dawn Chorus Day this year was on Sunday 3 May. This was during lockdown and during the time that I was making my lockdown walks, which have become The 42 walks of Contención Island [https://martinpeccles.com/other-sound-works/the-42-walks-of-contencion-island/ ] – more of which later. The walk I made on IDCD will be featuring in a Tyneside Sounds Society: Dawn Chorus Broadcastathon.
I’ll let Michael from The Tyneside Sounds Society, take up the story …
“The Tyneside Sounds Society invited people living in Tyneside and the north east of England to record the dawn chorus between 3am and 6am as part of a very special regional RecordAthon. Over 30 people took part, recording on phones, fancy bits of kit and also simple digital recording devices and microphones. People submitted over 13 hours of recordings; some long, some short – all fantastic! So what better way to present them then have an uninterrupted dusk till dawn BroadcastAthon on the amazing Star & Shadow Radio. Broadcast starts this Saturday 10pm and will finish around 11am the next day. I don’t expect you to stay up all night but it’ll be a nice chilled thing to go to bed and wake up to. You’ll also be able to listen to most of it via the Star & Shadow Radio showreel.”
You’ll be able to listen to it HERE >>> https://mixlr.com/star-shadow-radio <<<
06:42 – 07:28, wind NE 2 gusting 3, temp 8C (feels like 8)
A report on plans for coming out of lockdown is leaked to the BBC as Downing Street plays catch up over the membership and deliberations of SAGE.
to the eastern peninsuLa cross thE main sound along the gArdens a small monKey puzzle tree grows in a front garden a holly tree dome on a Stick pass through a Pulse of vehicles step into the green quIet ivy truNks sawn at the tree’s base pass a quarry Dimmed with shrubs the two runners dIstance-pass two ducks Stand on the edge of the weir move along above the burn’S flow a gatehouse roof tilEs missing a blackcap muMble-sings behind a wall along the Beat of the channel of sound the next train at pLatform two is for regent centre in the back-allEy plants grow in bins and buckets
martin.p.eccles: walk time place sound 