north inner 16 minutes The Poplars High Street The Grove Grove Avenue Twilight moving towards dawn Closed curtains block out street lights South wind blows traffic noise A robin starts to sing
north inner 16 minutes The Poplars High Street The Grove Grove Avenue Twilight moving towards dawn Closed curtains block out street lights South wind blows traffic noise A robin starts to sing
southwest inner 3 minutes The Drive Moor Place Woodlands Oaklands Moss dots the pitted tarmac among the alleyway leaf litter A single Blue Tit and the distant calls of Jackdaws A blackbird materialises atop a mahonia drops into the next garden Five skeins of pinkfeet about 150 birds fly north calling
west outer 4 minutes The Drive Westfield Drive Oakfield Road Kenton Road Elmfield Road The road bounded by utility services roadworks traffic stops and starts A boy on his bike pedalling along in his superhero wellies A man walks with two poles a woman runs by
southeast inner 13 minutes The Drive High Street Moorfield In the warm wind the snow is melting fast A sense of release from the cold a first glimpse of spring
southwest inner 16 minutes The Drive Westfield Drive Fernville Road Park Villas Road noise drifted in on the wind Little moves in the cold-gripped cul-de-sac
Day 40 Saturday February 13th
southeast inner 11 minutes The Poplars High Street Little Moor Jesmond Dene Road Great North Road By a hawthorn and bramble hedge shelter from a cold south wind Traffic slows and speeds comes and goes A lone runner crosses the road above magpies follow their own map along treetops Footprints in the snow tracks into the bushes to a hole in the fence
Having now settled on how to put this work onto my website there are now four weeks of sounds –
https://martinpeccles.com/other-sound-works/contencion-island/walking-to-the-s…ontencion-island/
– all on the imaginary island and from locations chosen by chance … a very random lockdown …
The second week of the third lockdown …
a week of sparrows, starlings, sleet and snow …
I am slightly behind (in fact, 30 days behind) presenting my continuing, unfolding story of Contención Island. During the first lockdown I defined the island by virtue of my walking from my home. During the second lockdown I walked the shoreline of the island, an imagined coastline along the edge of the sea. So … in this, the third lockdown, I have been populating the island with sound. Dividing the island into quadrants based on the points of the compass and then dividing each quadrant into an inner and an outer zone I have used ‘chance procedures’ (random number generator for those of you with a quantitative bent) to sequence the quadrants, zone and duration of recording. Each day I walk the island to that day’s quadrant, and I record the sounds of the island.
Unlike the pre-defined 28-day lockdown in November I had (and have) no idea how long this will continue. I have been doing this for all of this lockdown – 30 days and counting – and have sufficient numbers for almost 14 weeks – I hope that I do not need them all!
I am now in the process of adding the sounds (and accompanying image and text) to my various web sites – I will catch up the first four weeks and then add them a week at a time.
You can find the first week of island sounds here –
Lockdown-2 has ended, and this stage of the work is complete.
You can find the work together here as a playlist or at https://martinpeccles.com/other-sound-works/a-walk-round-contencion-island/
A video of the maps is here – https://youtu.be/wQyWSlwLn-s