A Closer Listen
Today is the first ever World Day of Glaciers, a brand new observance launched by the United Nations, who have also proclaimed 2025 the International Year of Glaciers’ Preservation. In conjunction with this event, ACL’s 2024 Label of the Year forms of minutiae, under the leadership of Pablo Diserens, is embarking on the year-long ice sounds series, beginning with today’s release from Marc Namblard and continuing with recordings from Ludwig Berger, Yoichi Kamimura, Cheryl E. Leonard, and Pablo Diserens. Read more about the Art for Glaciers Preservation here.
As the album begins, one hears the sound of the wind against the glacier, cold and forlorn. The advantage is that there are still glaciers to be heard. While today is a day to celebrate their existence ~ sight, sound, and gradations of blue ~ it is also a day of awareness. The lapping waves on “gravel beach,” the puffins, terns and plovers, the foxes and whales are reminders that glaciers are part of ecosystems and that when they thrive, local wildlife does as well. These sounds, captured in Iceland and Svalbard, relay more than the story of ice; they sing of survival and plea for preservation.
Second only to the subject matter is the form of presentation. Namblard allows the tracks to flow together like streams meeting oceans, creating a narrative that shines a light on the universal. The two recording locations are the main characters, in constant dialogue with one another, while the secondary characters inhabit subplots of their own. The water, no matter what form it takes, is one. At one point it covered the earth; at another point it may do so again. Nature creates and eradicates its own boundaries, even as humans debate the very idea of climate change.
If a glacier melting in one region can cause water in another to rise, is it too much to imagine that a hot spring can communicate with a fissure? In Iceland the very earth is calved, a reminder that the continents once were one. Namblard captures the same incident occurring in an iceberg. On land, a field is lost to deforestation; on the sea, the same principle holds true. Even if the devastation is less intentional, it remains causal.
The richness of these recordings cannot be overstated. Namblard is a generous director, and contributes a wide variety of sounds, from fragile to dramatic, soft to nearly overwhelming. Parts of “hot springs” are so dense they sound like drone music. As the icebergs split and fall into the sea, the avian community seems particularly agitated, like dogs in the presence of thunder.
But as dramatic as such exits may be, “drift and melt” brings the point home with subtle, everyday grace. We seldom notice ice melting in a drink; we only notice that is has melted. In the same way, the icebergs are drifting, the glaciers are melting, the seas are rising, and we barely notice; but one day we will. The Year of Glaciers’ Preservation, the World Day of Glaciers and arctic summer are all meant to call attention to what is already happening in hopes that the worst scenarios can be averted. (Richard Allen)
Fri Mar 21 00:01:47 GMT 2025