Back we go again to Miller's Dale in the Derbyshire hills. To this quiet spot, beside a shallow river wrilling. There's a country lane, and a steep grassy bank down to the river where an old tree grows. The tree, so gnarled, and with an unusually stout trunk, must have grown here for decades. Maybe even a century, or more. At about five feet from t…

Whilst walking up towards the observatory in the Kielder forest, we passed large areas of cleared woodland. "Fallen in the great storm of 2021" a passing forester explained in the afternoon sunshine. In some sections, the trees had been cut and stacked. Rows of tree trunks that smelled deliciously rich with the resin-y smell of Christmas trees. We …

In our quest to capture the pure sound of trees in true spatial quiet, we have without realising it, been following a long and winding path that has ultimately led us here. The Kielder Forest. It's a remote place for England. A place where the sound of trees can properly be felt and heard. A place where millions upon millions of trees grow together…

Time to take in a view. A panorama that changes with the wind and the tide. It's about six o'clock in the morning, and the Lento box has been recording through the night, tied to a windswept tree facing directly out towards Looe Island and the English channel. The scene has an aural horizon formed of disapated ocean breakers, crashing against rocks…

West Looe at night. A Cornish town on the edge of the English Channel. An edge where human things end and emptiness begins. We've shared a few captured sound scenes from here over the last month. This is the one if you're searching for the sound-feel of long, true night quiet. What is true night quiet? Capturing rich and detailed audible quiet, in …

The time has come for hot sun. Hot sun and basking. Hot sun and basking, and listening to crickets. And just sitting, amongst the crickets taking it all in. This sound scene is of the landscape around Arley station in Shropshire. Under high trees in full leaf. Golden fields as far as the eye can see, glowing in the afternoon sun. Farmland gold. And…

It is hard to believe this is North East London at dawn. And yet it is. 5am, last Wednesday. Day break, on the 1st of May. Misted air, barely a breeze. Verdantly breathable air, filtered and cleaned by the dense surrounding woodland. When at 8am the park gates are unlocked, the people will come to walk the winding paths. Bathe in the atmosphere cre…

In winter gales amongst moorland trees at night. Dark sky. Empty of everything, except for the invisible moving wind. A moor slopes steep up to the right. And half a mile of grassland slopes gently away down the valley, to the left. At the bottom, is a reservoir, hidden behind more trees. This grassy spot along a high gritstone wall, near an old ir…

You're not alone here, in this seaside town. A place of hot pasties, hot cups of tea, and families on a day out. A place of rolling Atlantic waves. This is East Looe on the coast of Cornwall. Thick grey sky. April cold. A sprinkling of rain, But shut your eyes, and it could be summer. Find a good spot on the sand. You may need to move once or twice…

A fresh Cornish spring day last week, along the West Looe River valley. Hear an area of ancient woodland. Described as the lungs of Looe. It's Cornish rainforest. Trees, that go back in time, farther than we can imagine. Walk inland, with the river to your right. Soon it'll be endless oaks, trunks covered with moss, all around you. As far as the ey…

A birds ear view over Plymouth in the far south west of England. Plymouth in a fast gusting storm. Storm Kathleen. This is how it sounded from behind the huge plate glass window of a comfortable cushioned room on the fourth floor of a hotel the night before last. The hotel overlooks a district called The Hoe, where one of the original Eddystone Lig…

Today marks four years of Radio Lento! We launched on 29 March 2020. Since then, a hundred and forty hours of material shared. Hundreds of thousands of ad-free and cost-free downloads. Long-form audio recordings. Of natural and empty places. In high precision spacious sound. Real aural essences of what it is to be present and immersed in a real pla…

In late December 2020 we were given permission to make a long form landscape recording of Abney Park nature reserve in north east London. Abney Park is an area of long established woodland, surrounded by busy streets and major roads carrying traffic in and out of central London. It's an oasis of tranquility used by locals to escape from urban livin…

Nothe Fort in Weymouth, on the Dorset coast. An old sea fort that celebrated its 150th birthday in 2022. For most of these years, it has been able to stand, looking out to the sea around Portland, amidst pristine clear night silence. Against the velvety quiet, tidal water ebbs and flows, rises and falls, swells and recedes, softly, around semi-subm…

Everything sounds different in the night. Close things sound sharper. More precise. That which is farther away, sounds larger, though it is still farther away. The sound image of the night, is curiously paradoxical. And yet in an evolutionary way, it is the night context where our hearing may have fundamentally developed to fulfill its primary role…

Here, take a seat on the bank. There's nobody about. Just you and the stream. And the birds of course. Cast your eyes around. Take it all in, before you get comfortable. Steep meadows all about, sloping down into this water meadow. With just you in it and a hazel tree, laden with catkins. No wonder this water's running so fast. There's been so much…

You can imagine them. The telegraph poles. The long line of them that stand along the Creel Path, on the east coast of Scotland. The thousand year old, empty Creel Path, that provides an ancient way between Coldingham and St Abbs. Imagine them now it's night. The deserted path. Jutting up into the deep dark sky. Charcoal black. Standing firm agains…

Steep grassy meadows. Grazing sheep. Overgrown hedgerows. Thickets. Narrow stony streams, sometimes with sandy banks. Grit stone walls, with tumbled stones where weather and animals have made a way through. Thistles. Clumps of dense nettles. Patches of tall, well established woodland. A muddy farm beyond. And another behind. And hours, if you want,…

Meteorological spring is approaching. Mornings are getting lighter. Song birds have found their voices and although it's still early in the mating season, they're already decorating the hour around daybreak with mellifluous sound. In a few short months, it will peak. Fast-forward to a June day. Far below the microphones, moorland water flows in a w…

Slide 1: Its the middle of the night. The Lento box is recording alone, tied to a cold, stark railing, that descends down the seawall into the water. Its an ear-witness to the nocturnal sound of this estuary place. East of Burnham-on-Crouch, facing due south, across the river, to Wallasea Island on the other side. There's a bare wind, and the tide …

Fresh rain. Fresh woodland rain, from Miller's Dale in Derbyshire. From a hedgehog's perspective. Low on the forest floor, amidst the leaf litter, and the tangled ivy. A hidden hedgehog's place where only raindrops that have missed every leaf, twig and branch above, lands. In total darkness the night before, we'd tied the Lento box to the broad bas…

Below a stone circle high on Dartmoor called the Nine Maidens, there's a stream. It threads its way down through steep sloping pastures. In the distance, just a fine, silvery, crooked line. It enters an area of dense forest. Becomes enmeshed with the sound signatures of tall, reflective, overhanging trees. Of sparse woodland birds. And disappears o…

There are spacious places in the world, where outcrops of woodland can be heard singing together in strong winter gales. Upland places. Uninhabited places. Naturally exposed, where the upper reaches of the land meet with the sky. Singing, to trees, does not involve what we have as vocal chords, or hitting the right note, or picking the right moment…

The night we captured this soundscene of Cooden Beach in East Sussex, there was a brisk onshore breeze blowing in from the west. West is to the right of scene, where the incoming waves can sometimes be heard making first landfall. It's February. It's coming up to 11pm. The sky is a deep dark velvet, and the clean sea air, is hovering around 6 degre…

Three o'clock has struck. Up steep ladders, on the top platform of the belfry inside Rye Church, the ancient clock counts through this small night hour. Its regular sound blends with long and undulating gusts of fresh sea air. Air that's travelled, over miles of sand, shingle and marshland, from out on the open sea. An ever changing pressure of mov…

(Hello if you are new here! We're a different type of podcast. Here's a few tips about how to get the most out of listening to Radio Lento.) Twilight's coming. And a storm. To be half way up a lonely Peak District moor, off the puddled track, looking down, into a mixed plantation of tall murmuring trees. Scots pine and spruce. Tall, hushing conifer…

(Hello! We're a different type of podcast. Before you listen, here's a few tips about how to get the most out of listening to Radio Lento.) From here, steep up a winding path above the harbour, the ocean waves crash onto the ancient seawalls of St Abbs on the east coast of Scotland, in full spatial detail. Swirling currents of bouncing swell, softe…

The rain came down, in the early hours of this morning, as I write. Lovely rain. Light to moderate. Temperature 7. Dew point 4. Wind EastNorthEast, gusting 8 knots. Enough to drift the ice cold raindrops. And ruffle the leading edge of the wide tarpaulin, that we've stretched over our back yard for shelter. And to make the rain sound better. More d…

Warm inside an all-weather coat. Facing out across the water. Sat, boots wedged against the top ridge of the slanted seawall. There's rain in the air. Thirty minutes to take in this wild estuary place, you tell yourself. Right of scene the small Essex town of Burnham-on-Crouch. Directly ahead across the water Wallasea Island. Low lying. A vegetated…

Dent station lies on the historic Settle to Carlisle railway between Blea Moor Tunnel and Rise Hill Tunnel. It's the highest operational railway station on the National Rail network in England. The highest and we feel the best because it is so extremely wide open. So extremely exposed. Set in the North Yorkshire Dales National Park, Dent station se…

The atmosphere inside a bird hide is quite unusual, as interior spaces go. Low wind moaning in the drooping wires between telegraph poles. Whispering rushes and siffing seed heads of marsh grasses. Indistinguishable shifting murmurings, of the surrounding landscape, blown in through low letterbox windows. To the ear there is a lot of outside to be …

It's always strange when we leave the Lento box behind to record overnight. The feeling is strong, but also hard to pin down. The Lento box feels like a trusted friend, even a family member now. It has taken us years to build and refine, and lives on the shelf in our kitchen when its not out on a job which makes it more than just an object. It's tr…

The experience of being out in the wide open on Higham Marshes in Kent on a warm May afternoon is nothing short of glorious. It's a perfect location for the Lento mics too. Earlier this year we walked through the nature reserve en-route to the old fort on the Thames and left the Lento box to capture the sound scene of the Higham Marshes nature rese…

An hour of pure falling water in a natural wide open landscape. Captured in the early hours of yesterday morning in the hills of Derbyshire. A place off the beaten track. Up in the hills. Rugged. Reached by a steep up climb holding for balance on arm-thick sapling trunks, whilst stepping between winding deer tracks. An old holly tree stands amongst…

We're hugely grateful to Revd Paul White of St Mary's church at Rye for enabling this special recording to be made. An aural presence of St Mary's church. Captured through the night of the 3rd of October. This passage of time is as it happened, from midnight to 1am. Experience being in the nave, then perched high in the belfry looking down from the…

There, thought the old drystone wall. I knew it. A tawny owl. Flying silent, up top the field. It'll only be a shadow, if ever you do get to see it. Better get to where you're going my feathered friend. The rain's coming. Not long, I'd give it, what, five minutes before the first shower. A flurry. That's all. At least to start with. Night minutes m…

Near a limpet covered wall, beaten into shape by high tide waves and squally weather, are some rocks submerged in shingle. Rye Harbour shingle. Sun warmed, they've got just enough flat on top, for two to sit. And enough yards from the water too. For you not to get wet. And yet, from time to time, you do. But only a speck, thrown by an exuberant wav…

You strode up to this field, through lush meadow, for a better view over Arley station. And now you're here. It's a perfect Shropshire August day. Blue sky. Light breezes. Hot sun on your back. Nearly time you think looking up into the sky, far right, for any sign of smoke. The whole station's in view from up here. Here beneath the tall whispering …

What happens, inside slow forest, is not much. Just the odd snap and crack, of a dry twig dropping, every now and then. I know sometimes there is a rook. And I know a raven too, if you've managed not to fall asleep. And echoes. Of passing people on the trail. And of seagulls and roosting wood pigeons too. Every now and then. No, not much happens, i…

This onshore breeze. A pleasant one, will not cuff too much against your ears. It'll flutter. Like a dark brown feather quivers, on a current of moving air. It'll be steady too. As a pleasant onshore breeze is. As the horizon is, from whence it came. Rising, at its centre. And falling away, almost imperceptibly either side of its farthest edges. A …

Miller's Dale. Steep sided. A valley in the Derbyshire Dales with magnificent contours. High rocky outcrops. Sheer faced cliffs. Green fields plunging down to a quiet, winding river. It's a place where geologists go, to see the evidence of lava flows from millions of years ago. Where historians go, to marvel at Victorian viaducts and tunnels cut by…

High, in the remoteness of the Cumbrian hills above Dentdale, with buzzards circling overhead, we found a fir forest. Tall, elegant trees, reaching up to the sky. All leaning, slightly, against a mild August breeze. The mild, long distance, cross country breeze. The hill was steep, so we stopped to take in the view behind. It was then we heard the …

For this last August intermission episode we've made you a montage of *sleep safe* sound-scenes selected from four overnight recordings. From the sea wall at Burnham-on-Crouch, looking out over panoramic tidal estuary waters by Wallasea Island. An oak tree deep within the Forest of Dean where woodcock make their roding flights. A remote fishing vil…

For this penultimate intermission episode, we've made you a montage of sound-scenes selected from four enchanting woodland episodes. A forest ravine high in the Derbyshire hills. Under a tree above the town of Wooler, in Northumberland. A waterfall gorge on Dartmoor. And finally, the mysterious murmurings from deep within the Forest of Dean. Here a…

We're taking an intermission during August. Rather than disappearing, we're made you a montage of sound-feels selected from previous episodes. This week's theme is coastal. Listen to four lovely clips of coastal scapes we've captured. Take a tour from Tenby in South Wales, Coldingham Sands in South East Scotland, and Nothe Fort on the Jurassic coas…

We're taking an intermission during August. Rather than disappearing, we're sharing a different type of episode, each with a theme, using some of the best bits from previous episodes. This week's theme is rain. Here are four glorious rain scapes. Travel with the rain as it falls, on a wide open coastal landscape, a walled garden in London, and on h…

A shadow grey rock, the size of a stranded ship. Radiating heat, remembered from the midday sun. Around it, rock pools, and smooth curving shapes. Like sleeping seals. You're out. Alone. For a late evening walk. Overhead, and behind, the sky is a deep, deepening blue. An end-of-day blue. But to your right, on the low west horizon, it's still blazin…

You find yourself, suddenly out. On the other side of the wood. The edge, of a wide open empty field. A meadow. Tall elegant trees, given way to a high, bright sky. Standing silently. You can feel the heart of the forest behind you. Hear its echoes. Its leaves near and far, rustling. How one tree creaks. How banks of soft summer air move spatially …

The sound-scene is of a smooth, sunrise sea, heard from a tree, growing up out of a bundle of boulders, close to the water's edge. It's early April, and just after daybreak. The Lento kit is in the tree, capturing the wide spatial quiet of this place with nobody about, right beside Nothe Fort in Weymouth on the south coast of England. Ahead, lookin…

The cabin, is compact, in every way. Every inch, accounted for. Every component, slotted in, perfectly. And, with full rucksack and boots and spare boots and string bag, a bit of a squash to get in too. Once you're in though, once you've sorted, and stowed, and made things neat, any claustrophobic feelings will just, well, have magically evaporated…