Music and Environmental Studies

Since Environmental Studies is very interdisciplinary, I was curious if and how music and Env. Studies work together. And I was surprised: after a little research, there was a huge field dealing with music and Env. Studies, from "The World Soundscape Project" to "Acoustic Ecology" and so on. Though this is very fascinating, I still don't know if I my final project will deal with music at all. I definetively don't want to write a research paper b/c in this class I have the chance to do something else. And I think it should be something practical. The issue: I don't know how to combine this. Anyway,here are two sources dealing with music and Environmental Studies.

Dunn, David, and Rene van Peer. "Music, Language and Environment." Leonardo Music Journal 9., Power and Responsibility: Politics, Identity and Technology in Music (1999): 63-7

This is an interview with the sound recordist and composer David Dunn who created 'musical' pieces by combining environmental sounds (the song of a mockingbird, for example) with artificial sounds. Dunn explains his motivation, his thoughts and ideas. One of his major points is to show the interaction between humans and their surrounding environments.


Turner, Kate, and Bill Freedman. "Music and Environmental Studies." Journal of Environmental Education 36.1 (2004): 45-52

This article gives a broad overview of people's work in the area "Music and Environmental Studies" and mentions recent key topics. It further discusses the relations between music and the sounds of nature and how nature influences music (for example Beethoven's symphony No. 6, "Pastoral"). In the end, the authors show how music can help to create an awareness of environmental topics.