For horses, insects, birds, and pedal steel

"This recording from Machu Picchu was very beautiful on its own, with the resonant sound of hoof beats, and the sounds of birds and insects seeming to suspend time. I wanted to make sure any transformation of those sounds still honored those qualities. I wanted the piece to linger over those sections, so they're extended--by looping and by dropping pitch, to allow these sounds to touch lower parts of the sonic spectrum. (Even with years of digital work, my roots are in tape.) 

"I arranged the transformed sections of the field recording into a structure based on these excerpts of the recording, their transformed (or not) speed and pitch, and each excerpt's relations to the other excerpts around it. 

"The suspended-time quality of the original recording led me (as a guitar player) to think of the instrument most likely to mirror that quality: the pedal steel. I recorded multiple improvisations with the pedal steel in which I responded to the sounds of the field recording excerpts, in a kind of dialog with the sounds. They exist in their place and time, and my sounds exist in another, though we can communicate across those distances." 

Horses at Machu Picchu reimagined by Maurice Rickard.

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This sound is part of the Sonic Heritage project, exploring the sounds of the world’s most famous sights.

Find out more and explore the whole project: https://www.citiesandmemory.com/heritage