Ode to a Nightingale
There in the invisible night, the sweet song of the nightingale, summons me to wonder - which is dream and which is real life?
Was it a vision, or a waking dream?
Fled is that music:—Do I wake or sleep?
— Ode to a Nightingale by John Keats
Berce sur l’azur qu’un vent doux effleure
Swaying with the blue that a soft wind touches
L’arbre qui frissonne et l’oiseau qui pleure.
The shivering tree and the crying bird.
— Rossignol by Paul Verlaine
Many before me have been entranced by the song of the nightingale.
On this particular night, last weekend, at around 3 o’clock in the morning, I heard the nightingale sing for the very first time…
It was whilst visiting a remote location, tucked away in the heart of the Hérault region of Southwestern France. I had just finished working at a wedding at Château les Carrasses. As the dance floor slowly cleared, my gear was packed and the morning settled into stillness, I found a moment to walk out into the grounds. Somewhere in the dark, cool night invisible to my eye but yet so welcome to my ear I could hear birdsong - twinkling melodies of intricate construction - as I approached closer, there buried deep in the thicket before me - a lone nightingale shared its song with me and the night.
“Nobody returns the same…” according to Sam Lee - British folk singer, conservationist, artist and activist, upon hearing the nightingale’s song.
His debut novel 'The Nightingale, notes on a songbird' shares the epic tale of this highly endangered bird and their place in culture, folklore, music and literature throughout the millennia. He has witnessed on many occasion the transformational effect that the nightingale’s song can have on human beings. Across time it seems the nightingale has appeared as muse to many - a mystic intervenant or melancholic mirror who summons symbolic associations ranging from creativity, nature's purity, and, in Western spiritual tradition, virtue and goodness.
Nightingales are so extravagant in their singing that any attempt to describe their song in words is a tricky affair. Their bewitching repertoire of trills, buzzes and whistles have provided the source for many analysis and interpretations, yet there remains an unknown mystery hidden within their song. Humankind has evolutionary reasons for fearing the hostile darkness of night, yet there's something remarkably soothing and reassuring about hearing a nightingale exquisitely punctuating the silence.
- The ongoing moment ()“It had been some time since natural phenomena had captivated me like this. Often when I’ve been in far more unique environments (glaciers, rain forests) events which are unfamiliar might leave me in states of wonder and bewilderment. In those scenarios where we are traveling and separated from the everyday and mundane, the world renders itself as novel and open-ended. However, in given instances, our attention can be somewhat biased by the acknowledgement that this is different and - providing we’re open to it - a lot of things around us are going to be interesting.”
Reading Hans Christian Anderson’s famous fairytale - The Nightingale - we hear the story of an emperor who prefers the music of a jewelled mechanical bird to the song of a real nightingale. The jewelled bird can perform at the emperor’s command, even if the repertoire is limited, superseding the real bird, which requires periods of rest. The emperor banishes the real bird away, in favour of his shiny new replica, but when he is near death and the mechanical bird breaks, it is only the real bird whose song can heal him.
Recordings serve as wonderful preservations of time passed and moments experienced. But they make up but a fragment of the real experience of listening to the real sound. If you are based in the UK, or Europe, now is the time to stay awake late, or rise a little earlier and wonder into the woods to hear this beautiful bird in its natural environment.
EARTH.FM 🌍
https://earth.fm/recordings/french-nightingale/
This recording can be found amongst the earth.fm archive - a completely free streaming service of 700+ nature sounds from around the world, offering natural soundscapes and guided meditations for people who wish to listen to nature, relax, and become more connected to the environment
Check out their recordings of nature ambiences from sound recordists and artists spanning the globe, including some contributions of my own. Also check out their curated playlists of immersive soundscapes and their wonderful Wind Is the Original Radio podcast.
You can support the earth.fm project by signing up to their newsletter of weekly inspiration for your precious ears, or become a member and not only enjoy extra earth.fm features and goodies but help to grow new forests on our beloved planet.
“It is hard to discern what is meant in this speech of our winged cousins. Birds inhabit flesh profoundly different from our own. Our inattention further muffles their language. We wall them out with bricks that keep us indoors, inside self-made worlds, and with presuppositions, closely guarded vaults of the mind. We’ve made ourselves a lonely place, so quiet…
Let in the sound.”
The Voices of Birds and the Language of Belonging by David G. Haskell for Emergence Magazine
Got your own field recording story you’d like to share…?
I’m going to feature more of these stories in future. I really dig hearing other people’s perspective — the challenges, joys, trials and tribulations, however arbitrary or convoluted - so please feel free to get in touch!
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Thank you for being here with me.
Mat
🌻
A lovely post! Thank you also for citing my work.
Gorgeous!