Hearing the world’s wonders: project shares hundreds of audible gems

Hearing the world’s wonders: project shares hundreds of audible gems
Hearing the world’s wonders: project shares hundreds of audible gems An online library offers free access to sounds from 270 Unesco world heritage sites Armchair travellers can take a sonic tour of hundreds of Unesco heritage sites via a virtual library of atmospheric soundscapes available free-to-listen online. Sound artist Stuart Fowkes has been capturing and curating field recordings for a decade for his Cities and Memory project, which comprises more than 7,000 samples from some 2,000 contributors covering 130 countries. Its latest deep-dive offshoot, Sonic Heritage, takes in 270 Unesco sites and includes recordings of crickets chirping in Florence, Tibetan prayers in Kathmandu and the sounds from within India’s Taj Mahal.  “Sound is so immersive,” said Fowkes. “It can transport you back to somewhere you’ve visited before, or drop you dramatically into an entirely new space.” Sonic Heritage collates soundscapes from Fowkes’ own travels around Chile, Italy, Estonia and Germany, and d…