Symphony of the Season

My friend Dave Sluberski owns West Rush Media, LLC and is senior lecturer at RIT’s School of Film and Animation, where he specializes in sound design and technology. When discussing sound design for documentaries, he often talks about capturing at least a half hour of ambient noise from your surroundings for the film’s environment to sound authentic. He points out that environmental sounds change on an almost-weekly basis, year-round. To me, it seems that is never more true than in late summer and early autumn.

Woven together in a rich  tapestry are the sounds of the cicadas and tree crickets, the buzzing honey bee dipping into purple asters, the whir of lawn mowers punctuated by the occasional dog barking. Add in the coo of morning doves and the chatter of squirrels excited by the abundance of nuts that have dropped with tiny thuds.

If you could listen a little deeper, you might hear the jolting belch of a tractor coming to life, and the rickety rattle of a hay-strewn flatbed preparing to take jolly, laughing apple and pumpkin pickers into the fields on their missions of harvest.

Listen yet a little deeper and you’ll no doubt hear bows being rosined and orchestras tuning for season débuts…sewing machines whirring, paint lapping at flats, and the echo of lines being practiced to empty houses as theaters yawn to life after dormant summers.

Listen even harder, and you might hear the strains of Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker Suite, as ballet shoes shush across floorboards…or tiny lilting voices reciting Dickens as auditions launch for end-of-year festivities.

Tie all these sounds up with the brilliant and sparkling gold, crimson, burnt orange and forest green ribbons of autumn’s colors, and you have the makings of a magnificent symphony of sound and sight!