Hildegard Westerkamp and the Ecology of Sound as Experience.

Notes on Beneath the Forest Floor

Abstract

A pioneer of acoustic ecology, the composer and soundmaker Hildegard Westerkamp shows that sound is not only a mere vehicle of representation or way to arouse emotions: her musical works and writings activate an awareness that sound is a decisive dimension of the world. In this view, music becomes dialectical, allowing us to construct a subjectivity that would care for the world. The expression of this idea follows two modalities: on the one hand, it understands music as experience and, in particular, as experience of place; and on the other hand, it puts forward music’s capacity to create links, connections and bonds. The 1992 two-track tape Beneath the Forest Floor illustrates the development of these thoughts. “Composed from sounds recorded in old-growth forests on British Columbia’s West Coast,” this work “moves us through the visible forest, into its shadow world, its’ spirit; into that which [a]ffects our body, heart and mind when we experience forest” (H. Westerkamp, “Beneath the Forest Floor,” http://www.sfu.ca/~westerka/program_notes/forestfloor.html).