Sound Place Love

About the Work

Sound Place Love is a captivating, immersive audio installation through which audiences experience the profound connection between sound and our personal sense of place. Renowned sound artist Gordon Hempton, known as The Sound Tracker, has spent decades capturing the disappearing natural environments across the Earth, employing a specialized microphone that emulates human hearing.

Sound Place Love chronicles Hempton's journey recording some of his most striking and moving sound portraits in remote locations around the globe, while also shedding light on his personal struggle with hearing loss and subsequent adaptation to hearing aids.

Distilled from hundreds of hours of Gordon's recordings and personal interviews over two years, this installation invites audiences on an introspective auditory voyage — exploring how we perceive and appreciate the natural world through the medium of sound.

Technical Requirements

Full technical specifications for presenting Sound Place Love, including spatial audio setup, seating configuration, and installation requirements, are available for download below.

Download Tech Requirements (PDF)

Press

"Gordon Hempton is as rare as the thing he cherishes."

Los Angeles Times

"The world's foremost acoustic ecologist."

Canadian Geographic

"Pure, unedited nature — a blend of science and poetry."

OMNI Magazine

"Someday Gordon Hempton's recordings may be heard as the last echo of nature at its most natural."

Philadelphia Inquirer

"His recordings will immortalize the few remaining quiet corners of the Earth."

San Francisco Examiner

"There is something about them that makes you want to redefine the words 'truth and beauty.' Listening through headphones, with your eyes closed, inspires visions as vivid as outright hallucinations."

The Weekly

"Your ears are caressed by resonant acoustical poetry."

The Seattle Times

Credits

Created by

Braden Abraham & Gordon Hempton

Based on Recordings by

Gordon Hempton, The Sound Tracker

Directed by

Braden Abraham

Producer

Nick Schwartz-Hall

Installation Design

Timothy White Eagle

Lighting Design

Eric Southern

Sound Editing

Braden Abraham & Gordon Hempton

Additional Sound Editing

Elisheba Ittoop, Sadah Espii Proctor & Jackson Roach

Developmental support for Sound Place Love provided by Seattle Rep, La Jolla Playhouse, and Guildhall.