New Day – dawn soundscapes from across Australia

Peter Mumme (keyboards and natural sounds recording)

ABC Classics 476 5712

TPT: 78’47”

reviewed by Alice Woode

The notion of recording the sounds of nature – bird song, waterfalls, erupting volcanos and the sound of, say, scurrying insects –neither new nor unusual. But when used with imagination and taste, such soundscapes can often provide absorbing, soothing listening.

Peter Mumme has put together a compilation entitled New Day on the ABC Classics label which sounds a labour of love. Mumme calls this collection a celebration of “the dawning of the new day in various locations around Australia”. It would have taken a very considerable investment of time and thought to come up with this collection which deserves pride of place in any collection of those who cherish the sound patterns of the great outdoors.

For those whose CDs are solely devoted to conventional repertoire, it might well require a leap of faith to listen closely to what is, in essence, random sounds of nature together with some manmade effects.

Of course, some with conservative listening tastes, those who reject out of hand just about anything which isn’t – or cannot be – written down on manuscript paper, will remain unconverted. So be it; it is their loss. But for those coming to this genre for the first time and with an open mind, the response may be anything from bewilderment to outrage, from delight to amazement, from intrigue to fascination – and conversion.

Having listened to a good deal of this sort of thing, I would say that Mumme’s compilation is well to the fore of similar initiatives. It’s consistently imaginative in its blending of nature and manmade sounds. For those with keen ears and an enquiring disposition, try to accurately identify the cry of a wattle bird, gang gang cockatoos, crickets and frogs. It’s a gently relaxing way of passing time. No on will wrongly identify a thunderstorm.

It’s been quite an odyssey on the part of Mumme who has traversed Australia to record sounds, among others, in the Daintree, Alice Springs, Kingslake National Park and Coomalie. There are fifteen pieces in all which represent, inter alia, the Victorian Highlands, coastal New South Wales and the Northern Territory.

Choose a favourite track to work its gentle magic. Mine is track 14, recorded in southern New South Wales, described in the liner notes as “cool morning – wet grass – small creek runs ove rocks - shrike thrush calls – magpies in background…..”.

Who needs Valium when this gentle, soothing composite sound picture is available at the flick of a switch? And it isn’t habit forming either.

Copyright Alice Woode 2007

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