Heartmoor

"Heartmoor is a word coined by John Koenig in his Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows that means the place to which the heart is anchored, whether that place exists now or ever existed. And that is what this piece is about: the longing we feel to belong somewhere. Whether we’ve had that place and lost it or have never found it, we still seek it.

"Using melodies that travel through layers of sound worlds, this piece calls to mind various homes we’ve had, wish we’ve had, or might still have, and evokes a sense of longing. 

"I was drawn to this field recording because the sound of cicadas conjures up a nostalgia for the idle summer afternoons of childhood, which got me thinking about home. Then as I read that this field recording captures a moment where an outsider is invited to belong, I appreciated that this sound reflected the idea that when we seek to belong we are also seeking home. That attempt to belong is something I often thought about when I lived outside of my home country for many years, and I wanted to explore it in this piece."

 Petanque match in Anduze reimagined by Katie Semro.

Part of the Migration Sounds project, the world’s first collection of the sounds of human migration. 

For more information and to explore the project, see https://www.citiesandmemory.com/migration