Resonant Ecologies, Seminar 2: Alice Eldridge

Dr Alice Eldridge’s background in music, psychology (BSc), evolutionary and adaptive systems (MSc) and informatics (PhD) underpins creative and empirical interdisciplinary research in sonic (complex) systems at the interstices of music, technology and ecology. This includes improvisation, composition, field recording, instrument building and computational analysis of natural acoustic environments within the emerging field of ecoacoustics, braided with ideas and methods from adaptive and complex systems.

She has appeared on BBC TV Spring Watch and BBC radio 4 Costing the Earth as a soundscape ecologist; on BBC radio 3 Late Junction and Jazz on 3 as a free jazz cellist; on BBC radio 6 Lauren Laverne’s show as a contemporary chamber composer; and on BBC radio 1 John Peel show as a pop bassist.

Ecolistening for regenerative futures

Various schools of thought arrive at a similar understanding of the roots of our contemporary crises: that our current inability to perceive the true complexity of the world creates a disconnect from wider nature, each other and ourselves. Founded on the conviction that listening connects, our Ecolistening group at the University of Sussex develops, explores and applies different forms of technologically-mediated listening to address these issues at ecosystem, community and personal scales. This sounds grand but is sometimes very simple. I will share some of our ongoing collaborative projects in what we might dub regenerative techno-listening – from interpretable AI for ecological monitoring in nature recovery projects and community-based soundscape projects for eco-cultural connection in the UK, through indigenous-led participatory projects for intergenerational transmission of ancestral knowledge and bio-cultural heritage in Ecuador, to tuning in to non-dual experiences of rewilding landscapes with micro-phenomenology.