Voices through wires

The archival field recordings of Bayaka hunters captured by Louis Sarno were the starting point of this work, not only for their sonic richness, but for their ability to convey life and presence across time. The voices, full of rhythm, laughter, and communal energy, immediately suggested the potential to create a composition that honours their vitality while exploring cross-boundary cultures and beliefs. Rather than reconstructing the historical narrative or fixing the recordings in their original context, I was inspired by the idea of non attachment to source: once recorded, sound can outlive its moment and enter new acoustic environments, where it can be reshaped and reimagined.

In creating Voices Through Wires, the Bayaka voices form the structural backbone of the piece, alongside ethereal Muslim calls. Their rhythms, call-and-response patterns, and vocal textures guided the pacing and form of the composition. I approached these recordings as living material, letting their natural flow dictate the layering and movement of the work. Rather than imposing an external structure, I followed the inherent pulse of the voices, allowing the composition to emerge organically, with short layered beats on the drum machine and esoteric synth textures creating the bed for the overall soundscape.

Alongside the Bayaka material, I integrated field recordings from my travels in North Africa and vocal expressions influenced by African diasporic cultures, including Afro-American recordings recalling hip hop, richly inspired by African textures. These sounds were included not as contrast, but as connection, reflecting the interwoven cultural and sonic influences across Africa and how African sounds have shaped music worldwide. The piece brings together Central African hunter-gatherer voices, North African field recordings, and African diasporic vocal expressions into a single composition, exploring Africa as a continuum of creative and spiritual expression where ancestral and contemporary voices coexist.

The story behind the composition is one of listening, layering, and honouring sound as a living presence. The Bayaka voices, together with the additional recordings, create a dialogue between regions, times, and cultures. Forest and wire, field and studio, past and present coexist in the work. The aim was not to fix or reproduce history, but to allow the recordings to breathe anew, forming a composition that celebrates the mobility, vitality, and resonance of sound while connecting disparate African traditions in a shared sonic space.

Out in the forest with Bayaka hunters reimagined by Deep Dive Sound.

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Part of the project A Century of Sounds, reimagining 100 sounds covering 100 years from the collections of the Pitt Rivers Museum at the University of Oxford. Explore the full project at citiesandmemory.com/century-sounds