From the 29th March to the 5th of April 2024, Sally and Steve undertook a Dyski artist residency in West Cornwall. Situated in woodland close to Lamorna Cove, neolithic caves and standing stones, Sonic Rituals took the participants on a sonorous journey deep into the landscape and its histories.

As folklore activist and artist Ben Edge says, 'we are a ritual species' and for Sonic Rituals, Sally and Steve employed a rich variety of methodologies and activities to guide participants in their creation of sonorous ceremonies designed to invoke our primordial connection with sound.

In an energizing week of sound immersion in the Cornish landscape, participants who ranged from professional sound artists to complete beginners experienced a diverse range of sonic activities. The program developed deep listening practices that explored the subjective nature of sonic perception alongside field recording expeditions that investigated located sound and fostered a sense of place. Technical workshops introduced field recording equipment and techniques, including contact microphones and hydrophones, while also covering the capture of infrasound, ultrasonics, electromagnetic fields, and VLF signals. Participants learned basic editing, mixing, and installation approaches, created sound-based performative actions, engaged in collective din-making, and explored texture, grit, and even dance in sonic composition. Sound art lectures connected practice to theory sparking discussions on sound ecology, environmental responsibility, and historical sound practices and rituals. Throughout the residency, communal eating became a vital space for knowledge exchange, allowing this diverse group to share insights and deepen their understanding of sound as both an artistic medium and as a it connects people to landscape.

A mix of the residency soundworks was selected for the Radiophrenia Festival of sound and radio art, Glasgow 2025.

Soundwork and Feature: www.caughtbytheriver.net/a-man-called-adam-sonic-rituals

Sonic Rituals – A Reading List 

Attwood Brooks, J. (ed.) (n.d.) Cornish Ghosts and Legends. 

Biserna, E. (ed.) (n.d.) Going Out (Walking Listening and Soundmaking). 

Bonnet, F.J. (n.d.) The Music To Come. 

Burkhalter, T., Beyer, T., and Liechti, H. (eds.) (n.d.) Seismographic Sounds (Visions of A New World). 

Dwyer, T. (n.d.) Composing With Tape Recorders. 

Kahn, D. (n.d.) Earth Sound, Earth Signal: Energies and Earth Magnitude in the Arts. 

Kelly, K. (ed.) (n.d.) SOUND. 

LaBelle, B. (n.d.) Background Noise, Perspectives on Sound Art

Lane, C. and Carlyle, A. (eds.) (n.d.) Sound Art Now. 

Lentini, D. (ed.) (n.d.) Soundscapes As A Journal (No 3). 

Morton, T. (n.d.) All Art Is Ecological. 

Oram, D. (n.d.) An Individual Note: of Music, Sound and Electronics. 

Tate Modern (n.d.) Radical Landscapes, Art, Identity and Activism. 

Weird Walk (author) (n.d.) Weird Walks - Weird Walk: Wanderings and Wonderings Through the British Ritual Year. 

Williams, G. (n.d.) How to Write About Contemporary Art.