Rainstorm in Borneo

Track Listings

1. Rainstorm in Borneo

Editorial Reviews
About the Artist
Renowned naturalist and sound designer Dr. Bernie Krause has traveled the world capturing the soundscapes of exotic natural environments. Dr. Krause began his groundbreaking work in bioacoustics and environmental recording in the late 1960's, and much of his work has been accomplished with techniques and technologies that he personally developed. His "In A Wild Sanctuary" (1970) recording earned a place in history as being the first recording to use environmental sounds as both a central component of orchestration and as a statement about the environment.

Dr. Krause's diverse achievements include 10 recordings for The Nature Company that have enjoyed over $24 million in gross sales over a period of 6 years. Development of the audio technology innovation known as the Intelligent Show System (for public exhibitions and installations), and his Music and Word Series of spoken word documents that include "Ishi - The Last Yahi." Dr. Krause recently published the book "Wild Soundscapes" (2002) that includes a full-length CD featuring a sampling of natural sounds.

Product Description
Camp Leakey, located in the southwest quadrant of Borneo, has been home to Biruté Galdikas' world-famous orangutan rehabilitation site for some years. Aside from orangutans, the forest vibrates with the sounds of many birds, insects, and other mammals. The air becomes very thick and still just before the typical afternoon storms. Creatures become very quiet as the tension mounts. Then, all hell breaks loose and the drama of the tropics becomes apparent in ways only a sound recording can capture. Aprés le deluge, as the storm cells move off toward the horizon, the soundscape returns, once again, revitalized by the cleansing and renewal that has just occurred.

RAINSTORM in BORNEO encompasses a day in the rainforest of southwest part of the island. At first light, birds begin to stir and gibbons invoke the dawn with their languorous duets. Reverberant sound fills the forest from every perspective and every vocal organism. As the sun passes the noon meridian, storm clouds gather on the horizon, thicken, and move in our direction. The forest becomes still in anticipation of coming events. We are not disappointed as the first cloudbursts shatter the calm, draw nearer, and then, BOOM!, we are hit with a very impressive strike that lands only 20 meters from where we are sheltered in a grove of ferns.

Rainstorm in Borneo,Bernie Krause,Wild Sanctuary

Rainstorm in Borneo

Tracks:

Rainstorm In Borneo

Album Description

This forest looks so formidable but signs of fragility are everywhere. Planes fly overhead taking miners and owners to dig gold upriver. Chainsaws cut away the hardwood that has taken millenia to flourish. Our dugout canoe is tethered to the aerial root of a fig tree along the edge of a mangrove swamp. We are watching a local fisherman try to catch a single once-abundant fish for his family's supper. In the meantime, we are trying to capture what may be the last gasp of this ancient forest voice before the biophony dies, a result of the effects of arsenic and mercury leaching from the mines and the silt from uncontrolled runoffs left by clear cutting. All around us are more fish belly-up than we care to think about--normally these provide food for many birds and reptiles that live along the river'sedge. We have no idea what they will do--what we will do. This work is our gentle living and we, like the fisherman, know nothing else that nourishes us more than this passive act. But when we hear gibbons singing a lyrical duet in the early morning haze, or catch the glimpse of a female orang-utan high in the canopy of the forest playing with her baby, it rejuvenates us, makes us hopeful that others will recognize the beauty of the place and make it as precious as the gold and timber some think they cannot live without.

Customer Reviews:

It's just like being there!.......2000-01-02

This is my favorite environmental CD - I listen to it while I read about the old west. No matter how often I hear it the two largest thunder claps always cause to to jump! It is so real. I wish I could find more of Bernie's recordings.

Average customer rating:

Rainstorm in Borneo

Manufacturer: Wild Sanctuary
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

General | New Age | Styles | Music

General | New Age | Indie Music | Stores | Music
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ASIN: B00008AIV7
Release Date: 2003-01-01

Tracks:

Rainstorm in Borneo

Album Description

Camp Leakey, located in the southwest quadrant of Borneo, has been home to Biruté Galdikas' world-famous orangutan rehabilitation site for some years. Aside from orangutans, the forest vibrates with the sounds of many birds, insects, and other mammals. The air becomes very thick and still just before the typical afternoon storms. Creatures become very quiet as the tension mounts. Then, all hell breaks loose and the drama of the tropics becomes apparent in ways only a sound recording can capture. Aprés le deluge, as the storm cells move off toward the horizon, the soundscape returns, once again, revitalized by the cleansing and renewal that has just occurred.