A Century of Sounds feature on the Battiti show on Rai Radio 3 in Italy, broadcast on 26 February 2026.
Featuring:
- Drawn to the circle by Ana Habesh
- Mwana wevhu by Ndinibeatz
- Kinnaur calling by Sonic Soma

Plus discussion of the project and our partnership with the Pitt Rivers Museum.

When I first heard this recording of men gathered around a guitar, singing fragments of traditional songs and inventing lyrics on the spot, with women and children laughing in the background - it hit me: music isn’t just sound, it’s connection. It's a reminder of the timeless beauty in coming together, sharing stories, passing down traditions, and creating something meaningful in the moment.

Curious about what the singers were saying, I reached out to people from Central Africa, and the response was surprising - those improvised lyrics were built from single words in regional slang. In this kind of music-making, it often starts with one word, then another, and before you know it, a whole verse is born. It’s spontaneous, alive, and beautifully organic.

For my remix, I used the main melody of the original field recording as the foundation, blending in those improvised words as fillers. I also incorporated the traditional rhythm of Soukous - a guitar-driven genre from Congo, often referred to as Congolese rumba, which mixes Afro-Cuban folkloric influences.

Just like our ancestors sang around the fire, united by song, we too continue this tradition today - whether around a campfire or through modern technology, remixing old recordings into something new. Music is more than entertainment; it’s a bond, a message, a celebration of community, and a bridge to the past. From kings sending musicians ahead of their armies to show unity, to modern-day communities of music lovers sharing sounds across the globe - we keep passing the sound from generation to generation. And that’s what keeps us together.

Afternoon beneath a palm shelter reimagined by micca.

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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

This piece is built around a field recording from the sound collections of the Pitt Rivers Museum of Berber beggars singing for charity.

Listening to this recording, across time, what struck me was not difference but familiarity. Themes of begging, homelessness and poverty recur in traditional songs from all cultures, spanning the centuries. Despite differences in place, language and technology, poverty, hunger, social injustice, and the vulnerability that comes with these things, remains constant.

Through my organisation in Whitby, Flash Company Arts, I frequently work with people experiencing homelessness and fragile economic circumstances. Hearing this recording, made more than 60 years ago, felt uncomfortably relevant to my daily work. These voices could belong to anyone, anywhere, right now.

The lyric “A Begging I Will Go” is borrowed from an ancient English folk song, first printed on a black-letter broadside in 1684. And still today, all over the world, people wake each morning to the same words: A begging I will go.

Nothing changes.

Beggars singing for charity reimagined by Rebecca Denniff (Subphotic).

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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

"Sapeh (type of three-stringed boat lute) being played": the instrument was recorded in Sarawak by collector Leslie Bennett.

From the sound collections of the Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford, being one of a small number of recordings of the musical instruments in the institution's collections being played or discussed.

Recorded by W. Leslie Bennett.

Copyright Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford.

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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

From the sound collections of the Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford, being from a collection of reel-to-reel tape recordings of Berber (Ait Haddidu) music and soundscapes made by members of the Oxford University Expedition to the Atlas Mountains of Southern Morocco in 1961.

Recorded by Audrey Butt, Michael R. Emerson or Ralph Hudson Johnson.

Copyright Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford.

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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

From the sound collections of the Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford, being from a large collection of cassette tape and digital audio tape recordings of Bayaka music and soundscapes made by ethnomusicologist Louis Sarno mainly in the Central African Republic (and the Republic of Congo) between 1986 and 2009.

Recorded by Louis Sarno.

Copyright Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford.

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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

I listened to the piece and researched any historical links between Plymouth, my home town and Sarawak, were the original recording by Leslie Bennet was made.

It turns out there were three white "Rajahs" of Sarawak and they were members of the Brooke dynasty: James Brooke, who founded the rule in 1841; his nephew Charles Brooke, who succeeded him; and Charles' son, Charles Vyner Brooke. Although not from Plymouth, all three of the “Rajahs of Sarawak” are buried in the small churchyard of St Leonard's at Sheepstor on Dartmoor, just outside of Plymouth. James Brooke did at one time set sail from Plymouth in 1838, arriving at Sarawak the following year.

The name for Sarawak means the land of the hornbill. This piece is an ode to this journey.

I listened to the recording of the Sapeh and learnt the rough pentatonic scale used. I isolated a few segments and tried them on guitar to get the ideas flowing. The recording of the Sapeh is sampled and utilise throughout the piece. At times I have used it to double the bass line or to give a new melody line or rhythm.

The main “nautical” melody is built upon a four bar segment of the original recording. The clicks and resonance of the instrument are also used to give some ambience and texture. I have used acoustic guitars, hand drums, mandolin, electric guitars, sequenced midi instruments and drums using GarageBand. I also used open source recordings of seagulls in Plymouth and Hornbills in Sarawak.

Sapeh (three-stringed boat lute) reimagined by Daniel Chudley - Le Corre.

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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

The field recording that inspired this composition features a Bayaka musician playing the geedal, an instrument whose sound is deeply connected to the forest, communal memory, and oral transmission. When I first listened to the recording, what struck me was not only the melody, but the space around it: the breath, the rhythm, and the sense of conversation between the player, the instrument, and the environment. The geedal, whose timbre closely resembles the adeudeu from Western Kenya, where I come from, felt less like a solo instrument and more like a voice embedded within a living ecosystem. This immediately shaped my approach to the composition, not as a reinterpretation that dominates the original or places it in the background, but as a dialogue with it, allowing the geedal to remain the bed of the music.

As a Kenyan artist working across traditional African instruments and contemporary production, I was drawn to reimagine the recording in a way that honours its origins while allowing it to travel across geographies and time. I approached the piece asking how I could respond musically without erasing the cultural specificity of the Bayaka sound world, while also connecting it to my own cultural lineage as a Luhya artist from Western Kenya. The similarities between the geedal and the adeudeu created a natural bridge, making it possible to situate the composition within a shared African sonic language.

Technically, the field recording became the anchor of the piece. Rather than heavily manipulating it, I preserved the geedal’s texture and rhythmic integrity. In collaboration with my friend and producer, Ambrose Akwabi of Mandugu Digital, we conducted additional research on the Bayaka people to better understand their world, sounds, and musical techniques. Through this research, we chose to reimagine the work through an East African lens, reflecting my Kenyan background and Ambrose’s experience as a Kenyan based in Tanzania. We noticed strong sonic and rhythmic similarities between the Bayaka, the Luhya community, and the Wagogo of Tanzania.

We began by stripping the original recording of its vocal elements, leaving only the geedal, which we looped and layered with bass, hi-hats and muffled snare, and a restrained kick. I recorded shakers and udu to introduce a watery, grounding texture, and added my voice in response to the phrasing and emotional tone of the original performance. Chants were used intentionally, with lyrics written in Luhya to echo the ancestral roots of the piece. The words narrate the story of the Bayaka people as custodians who have resisted disconnection from the forest and from nature. Ultimately, this composition is an offering: a bridge between regions, traditions, and listening practices, inviting the listener to experience the geedal not as an artifact, but as a living, resonant voice.

Balonyona playing the geedal (bow harp) reimagined by Liboi.

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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