Bernie Krause

The artificial noise in our lives is a debris field of arbitrary and often harmful signals. Our lives are riddled with sound: heavy-footed neighbours, an ambulance screeching nearby, white noise from the television. Unsurprisingly, the noisy environment in which we live has an immense impact on our concentration, alertness, and feelings of anxiety. To help us manage the rubble that hinders our mind and well-being, Bernie Krause whisks us through the practical steps that each one of us can take to reduce the unhealthy noise in your life and realize the healing powers of certain acoustic encounters. Along the way, we explore the difference between harmful noise and the signals that make us feel good, between noise as a stressor and soundscapes that serve to boost our emotional and physiological health and stimulate our productivity. By following his suggestions you'll discover what a wide variety of sound signatures represent; which ones you like, which ones you don't, and why. Thoroughly researched and accessibly crafted, THE POWER OF TRANQUILITY IN A VERY NOISY WORLD will show you how to gain control over your sonic experiences and live a more tranquil and enduring life.

You've decluttered your personal space, now it's time to tidy up your soundscape. At a time when noise and chaos compete for every moment of our attention, noted author, musician, and naturalist, Dr. Bernie Krause, introduces us to methods for turning down the clatter in our lives, restoring a sense of contentment, and reclaiming the calm. Just as some influencers inspire us to tidy up household clutter, The Power of Tranquility in a Very Noisy World takes personal organization a step further - into the sonic realm. Bioacoustician, Bernie Krause, shares healthful tips that identify and reduce the damaging aural assaults that besiege us - incoherent dissonance that impacts our health more than we may realize. With his reassuring guidance, you will be able to fine-tune your surroundings, improve your sense of wellness, reduce anxiety, and restore a sense of inner peace and productivity to your own acoustic space. The Power of Tranquility in a Very Noisy World is a revelatory and powerful book. Thoroughly researched and accessibly crafted, it's today's best quiet guide ­- directing you from a debris field of noise into a more tranquil, connected, and resonant life.

A founder of soundscape ecology offers a pioneering field guide for listening to and recording the sounds of the wild Through his organization Wild Sanctuary, Bernie Krause has traveled the globe to hear and record the sounds of diverse natural habitats. Wild Soundscapes, first published in 2002, inspires readers to follow in Krause’s footsteps. The book enchantingly shows how to find creature symphonies (or, as Krause calls them, “biophonies”); use simple microphones to hear more; and record, mix, and create new expressions with the gathered sounds. After reading this book, readers will feel compelled to investigate a wide range of habitats and animal sounds, from the conversations of birds and howling sand dunes to singing anthills. This rewritten and updated edition explains the newest technological advances and research, encouraging readers to understand the earth’s soundscapes in ways previously unimaginable. With links to the sounds that are discussed in the text, this accessible and engaging guide to natural soundscapes will captivate amateur naturalists, field recordists, musicians, and anyone else who wants to fully appreciate the sounds of our natural world.

A "passionate amalgam of science and autobiography" that will leave you hearing -- and seeing -- nature as never before (New York Times Book Review). Musician and naturalist Bernie Krause is one of the world's leading experts in natural sound, and he's spent his life discovering and recording nature's rich chorus. Searching far beyond our modern world's honking horns and buzzing machinery, he has sought out the truly wild places that remain, where natural soundscapes exist virtually unchanged from when the earliest humans first inhabited the earth. Krause shares fascinating insight into how deeply animals rely on their aural habitat to survive and the damaging effects of extraneous noise on the delicate balance between predator and prey. But natural soundscapes aren't vital only to the animal kingdom; Krause explores how the myriad voices and rhythms of the natural world formed a basis from which our own musical expression emerged. From snapping shrimp, popping viruses, and the songs of humpback whales -- whose voices, if unimpeded, could circle the earth in hours -- to cracking glaciers, bubbling streams, and the roar of intense storms; from melody-singing birds to the organlike drone of wind blowing over reeds, the sounds Krause has experienced and describes are like no others. And from recording jaguars at night in the Amazon rain forest to encountering mountain gorillas in Africa's Virunga Mountains, Krause offers an intense and intensely personal narrative of the planet's deep and connected natural sounds and rhythm. The Great Animal Orchestra is the story of one man's pursuit of natural music in its purest form, and an impassioned case for the conservation of one of our most overlooked natural resources-the music of the wild.