Radio Lento podcast

The moment we entered Shelve Wood we knew it was a perfect place to record. Shropshire is sparsely populated. There's only one B road in the Shelve Wood area. The country lanes carry little traffic, and on the day we were on-location the skies were very often empty of aircraft. These qualities are highly valuable because they allow the delicate natural sound in the environment to reach your eardrums unaffected. Hearing the leaves of one city tree hushing in the wind is a nice thing to experience, but hearing thousands of trees all murmuring together across a huge reverberant natural space is an aural experience that brings nature connection on a completely different level.

Shelve Wood is a forest of diverse flora and fauna with mixed fir and deciduous trees. The ecosystem extends over approximately five hundred acres. The ground beneath the trees is intensely absorbent to sound, layer upon layer of fallen pine needles and leaves that must have lain untrodden by the feet of anything larger than the smallest of woodland creatures for decades. It's the physical properties of the trees, their solid trunks, their branches and complex leaf systems that convert the energy of the wind into hearable sound, and over distance form resonant spaces that catch and amplify the calls of the birds.

* We made this recording in May 2025. the Lento box recorded within this location alone and non-stop for twelve hours. This one hour segment captures the dawn chorus just after sunrise. At 20 minutes a blackbird sings high up in the tree holding the microphones. Ear-witnessing this at such closeness is only possible using microphones recording alone. Later in the segment a cuckoo enters the forest to mid-left of scene. Capturing the sound of a cuckoo is something that seems almost miraculous to us, although we have noticed over the six years we've been making recordings to share via Radio Lento that hearing cuckoos is not as unusual as we had previously thought. Nonetheless actually capturing the echoing calls of the cuckoo in a reverberant forest at close range and over a long period of time has never been something we have ever been able to achieve, until now. So we thank this cuckoo for singing so sonorously, and for helping us to mark six years of Lento.

** Thank you for listening and for all your support. Every time we tie the Lento box to a tree and press record we think of you the listener, and how through the Lento mics you can be transported through your ears into these richly detailed natural places.

*** It's Lento's 6th birthday next weekend. Celebrate by buying us a birthday coffee?

The Lento box records alone, tied to a tree, behind thickets of gorse. The night hours pass. The microphones capture the panoramic peace of this wild coastal landscape. Rye Harbour Nature Reserve on the East Sussex coast. The tree holding the mics overlooks one of the many small lakes across the reserve. In daytime these bodies of water mirror the sky, and provide different types of wildlife with a calmer place to be compared to the nearby sea. 

This passage of time is somewhere between 3am and 4am. Nothing is visible in the thick darkness but the soundscape is spatially wide, empty for periods, between waves of delicately detailed nocturnal bird activity. Mid left of scene, about half a mile in the distance, you can easily hear the sea. High tide is several hours away. The lake is dead ahead, and for the first thirty minutes remains silent because there is hardly any wind. To right of scene the inland landscape is mostly quiet, except for a hum that's floating across the fields, from what we guess must be some distant industrial buildings. 

Being mid-February the peaceful air does not last. A squally weather front moves in at 30 minutes. It brings persistent rain. Rain that sifts down in changing textures. Rain that sparkles as it lands on the still lake water. Unwitnessed moments in time captured perfectly by the microphones.

Exposed moorland trees create a strong natural source of undulating white noise when shouldering the brunt of a winter gale. The sounds they produce are uniquely enchanting  and an absolute delight to experience. For us it's the beating heart of what it is to be immersed in the great outdoors, and one of the reasons we set Radio Lento up in the first place. To capture and share the aural essences of the great outdoors for anyone (including ourselves) who want to experience but can't always get out to feel time passing in a real natural place. 

The sound-scene in this recording is entirely produced by trees in wind although at the very start there are a couple of tawny owls. Using headphones you will perceive the scene in its full panoramic width and depth. From far right of scene a line of trees (mixed fir and bare branched deciduous) grow along a ridge that descends into a meadow whose upper boundary aligns with the centre of the scene. From the centre the open meadow then slopes away and down the moor mid-left of scene. Far left of scene another ridge with higher elevation is visible to the ears, more thickly wooded, and despite being much further away generates deep brown turbulences as the wind grows in strength. As time passes the interaction of the ever-changing banks of wind blowing through the arrangements of trees builds and builds, creating a kind of vision of the place all-be-it entirely perceived through spatial hearing.

It was well after eleven at night at the very end of December when we headed out to find a place to leave the Lento box to record. The weather conditions were fresh and extremely dry. Not a hint of moisture or damp anywhere. The whole landscape was in the grip of a powerful winter gale. A Derbyshire gale, a thousand feet above sea level. Every twig and every fallen leaf was audible, sifting and shifting in the brisk turbulent air. As we descended below the treelined ridge we felt the depth of the sound being produced by the trees. Not quite a roar, more like a soft low rumble, sensed less through the ears than through the body. We found a tall fence post, and then left the box to record the gale as it blew through the whole night. 

* We made this recording in High Peak Derbyshire, December 2023 a couple of days before the year turned. This passage of time is from around 5am, just before the cockerel starts crowing in the nearby farm! The weather conditions were incredibly fresh and dry which is why the trees sound so clear and defined.

The waves settle into wavelets. The wavelets settle to calm. Then it's just the pure sound of estuary emptiness, at night.

Following on from episode 288 it's several hours later, about 4 in the morning, and the tide has finally turned along the exposed seawall opposite Wallasea Island.

The soundscape captured conveys the aural essences of this beautifully exposed and empty place. Near-scene the movements of tidal water. Mid-scene the occasional calls of hardy sea birds flying low through the night air. To right of scene the distant low hum of a bulk carrier ship, recently arrived, waiting in port to be unloaded.

The night before we'd scouted the area and tied the mics to a railing well above the high water mark. However due to a combination of tidal surge and a spring tide, the section of railing only just remained dry. Luckily the Lento box survived to capture a uniquely fascinating sound. The intricate and changing movements of estuary water, close-up, against a backdrop of pristine estuary quiet.

* We made this recording in August 2021, after discovering the River Crouch and the estuary landscape around Wallasea Island. The weather conditions were unseasonably rainy and windy at the time which has made these rain-free sections of the 12 hour overnight recording seem even more special.

We love the ambience of Sant Llorence de la Muga, a small village high in the Pyrenees. It's a beautifully peaceful place but we know the sound of the bells every quarter are not ideal for those wanting to spend time with the rain, the open peacefulness of mountainous quiet, and the occasional beeps of what we think are nocturnal frogs. So, this passage of time is from episode 281, adjusted. 

With the chimes carefully spliced out, this piece of captured quiet runs from just before 3am to just after 4am. Heavy rain begins to fall and the sky grumbles with thunder. The rain then eases off allowing you to hear beyond the distant white noise of the nearby shallow river and deeper into the night landscape. You may hear to the right of scene one and sometimes more tiny beeps from time to time. We think these are frogs. The sounds are both soft and yet very distinguishable in the soundscape. And comforting too, for some curious reason.