"I dearly love Iceland - and on one of our many visits I was fortunate enough to go whale watching and see two magnificent humpback whales swimming right by our boat, their fins touching. It looked like a gesture of love, and I thought of all of our stories of selchies and other sea creatures - lost dreams of swimming with the sea mammals, and them choosing to walk with us.

"We on the land, and they in the sea. This is my love song for those precious whales."

Humpback whale song off South Iceland reimagined by Rebecca Denniff.

"The piece is performed by Tara Milton (ex of 1990 famous bands 5.30 and The Nubiles) on Flamenco and acoustic guitar, and Giorgio Curcetrtri (played with Tara in The Nubiles and together they penned the classic ^Layabout^, indie Top Ten in 1994)) on Flamenco Guitar, Oud, Handclaps, Tambourine, Shakers, Bass and slide guitar.

"The music has been written by Tara Milton and arranged by Tara Miklton and Giorgioi Curcetti after listening to the Japanese percussion, recorded in Italy, and superimposed them on a dusk in the London area of Whitechapel."

Santarcangelo festival performance reimagined by Giorgio Curcetti and Tara Milton.

"I am a runner, so the sounds of people cheering runners instantly makes me smile. I initially thought I would use the a capella singing more than the cheering, but it would up being quite difficult to integrate any of the complex harmonies of that singing with any coherent musical ideas that I might introduce, so I would up focusing on the cheering.

"Once I found the samples I wanted to use, I wrote some music to accompany those samples, but later dispensed with all that and created pitched down samples to use for the off-kilter sustained bed throughout most of the track. All the sounds in the song have been sourced from the field recording, with the exception of a couple of the drums and the bass. Most of the percussion was actually sourced from the recording as well.

"I kind of doubt they are actually shouting "Give Me Your Toes", but that's what I hear, and it seems like a good name for a track about runners."

Singers cheering on Oslo marathon runners reimagined by Tristan Watkins.

"I was really struck by Ander Vinjar’s Heyr project, and the way he captures the sounds of the everyday and the ordinary at sites of historical trauma and violence. This piece works with one of the recordings from the café at Utøya. I treated it as a meditation on the café visitor’s questioning recognition of the bullet-holes still visible in the walls (Er det hull? - er det kulehull?").

"I'm interested in the relationship between what you can and can’t hear in these recordings - what’s implicit and explicit, buried or foregrounded."

Hegnen, Utoya reimagined by John Savarese.

Humpback whales song off Westman Islands, South Iceland. A 15 minute recording of a singing humpback whale made using a bottom-moored hydrophone in the Westman Islands (Vestmannaeyjar) archipelago in February or May.

Recorded by Paul Wensveen.

As a long-distance run, with the participants being over 95% women, takes part through the centre of Oslo, a group of female a cappella singers stands by the roadside, singing songs in English ("Don't Stop Me Now") and Norwegian to spur on the runners, and calling out individual runners' names and cheering. A joyous afternoon sound recording that's sure to raise a smile.

Recorded in September 2025 in Oslo, Norway by Cities and Memory.

Soundscape inside Hegnen, at the Café-building at Utøya, near Oslo. 13 young people hid here, and was shot by Anders Behring Breivik on 22nd July 2011. The bullet-holes and destroyed furniture is left as it was.

The Ambisonics recording captures close sounds from the wood, and very subtle whispering from a visitor asking "bulletholes, are these actual bulletholes?"

This soundscape-composition is part of the HEYR project, presenting 3-dimensional soundscapes from special locations, connected to special events. Find out more by visiting https://www.heyr.no

Recorded by Anders Vinjar, 2025.

A street performance as part of the annual Santarcangelo festival, followed by applause and cheering.

Recorded by Alexandra Genzini.