AUDIO GALLERY

Sounds Like

In boreal forest communities of the Northwest Territories, chopping spruce, birch and poplar trees is a common sound and a seasonal ritual. Dene people throughout the territory grew up chopping firewood for cook stoves, wood heaters and campfires. In collaboration with someone who has respect for the land, I wanted to show how an accepted seasonal sound is rooted in history, culture and land-based practices.I incorporate field recordings of everyday Northern sounds — wood chopping, bird calls, ice collapsing— to document how seasonal “noise” reflects social habits, land-based knowledge, and shifting technologies.

In 2015, my audio postcard Woodchop was selected for the Canadian Association for Sound Ecology’s juried online project Audio Postcard Canada.

It can be found here:

TRANSCRIPTION (sfx wood chop) … “My name is Jim Hope and I am originally from Fort Simpson. In my South Slavey Language it is pronounced Liidlii Kuemeaning the conjunction of the Liard and Mackenzie Rivers. (sfx wood chop) So me and my older brother, Peter, the two of us would take turns sawing and chopping wood. A lot of it had to do with ... I don't know what you call those saws, I think you call it a bow saw. (sfx sawing) We did a lot of that, me and Peter, and a lot of it had to do with earning change to go to the show at the Igloo Theatre and all that, kinda like selling newspapers nowadays. (chuckles, sfx stacking wood). Firewood was really important because in January and February a lot of times the mornings would be 30 or 35 below and you know it's cold when you get up and whoever makes the fire first is the person who gets up first or wants to get up first. Yah, these days I still have the enjoyment of cutting wood because I am still pretty physically active and (like) an old boxer, like George Foreman do it as part of their boxing regiment, so it's good cardio exercise. (sfx wood chop)” RUNS 1:51