From a south-west facing cliff edge on Firebeacon Hill, near Boscastle, Cornwall, UK, we eavesdrop on seabirds on the very close-by Long Island, while serenaded from behind by Woodstock Chimes of Pluto, with their vividly colourful high-pitched pentatonic sound. The latter does readily get into repeating sequences as the chimes' wind-catcher swings around in circles, but every time the sound seems to have a new freshness and radiance.
I don't know why, but that particular chimes sound — i.e., at that pitch and with that pentatonic note sequence, and with a backdrop of sea sound like we have here — always conjures up in my mind a sense of excited joyful departures of ships and boats; maybe the bustle of a busy harbour, but with a strong sense of occasion, those departures being out of the ordinary, with a sense of celebration. Historical memories, maybe — sailing off to a new land, maybe, and indeed maybe at last departing from slavery…
Birds heard are mostly herring gull, but the odd linnet, rock pipit and carrion crow are fleetingly heard. If you listen very carefully, especially with high-grade headphones, you may faintly hear a guillemot or two.
I recorded this on 1 June 2013, aiming to get a bunch of recordings, but conditions were mostly against that working out, and this was the only recording I kept, out of five that I made from there to just before Boscastle.
Advisory
Because of the processing to widen and sharpen the originally atrocious stereo imaging, the sea may sound rather phasey when listened to from certain speaker systems. Therefore high-grade headphones are the best solution.
This recording in progress. The tall craggy rock island whose top faces us is Long Island — apparently 'long' in Cornish place names means 'tall', not 'long' as is meant in proper English! The recorder was pretty-well on the cliff-edge, and so was getting direct sound from the sea at the foot of the island.
Telephoto view of Long Island (left) and Firebeacon Hill from the Willapark headland near Tintagel (on 30 October 2007) — the arrow pointing to the exact position of recorder for this recording.
Techie stuff
The recorder was Sony PCM-M10, with Røde DeadKitten furry windshield (original, more effective, version). It was set up on a Hama Mini tripod, which is not just 'mini' but tiny, with the chimes hung from a Zipshot tripod.
Post-recording processing was to apply EQ in Audacity to correct for the muffling effect of the windshield — and then more recently stereo widening / sharpening-up using the VST plugin A1 Stereo Control (160% widening).
Please remember to give this recording a rating — Thank you! 
This recording can be used free of charge, provided that it's not part of a materially profit-making project, and it is properly and clearly attributed. The attribution must give my name (Philip Goddard) and link to https://freesound.org/people/Philip_Goddard/sounds/699646/
Type
Flac (.flac)
Duration
44:24.739
File size
197.3 MB
Sample rate
44100.0 Hz
Bit depth
16 bit
Channels
Stereo
Comments
2 years ago
Just listening again to a little of this, I think I now recognise the peculiarity that @jakemakes is referring to, and it's best that I explain here.
Actually that isn't anything wonky about the recording itself, but is the nature of the sea sound there. The point is, this isn't like the sea breaking on a shore. Here, the sea is having constant little arguments with the very rugged and irregular cliff bases of the mainland (immediately below where the recorder is) and the very close bulk of Long Island, with only a narrow channel between them — and it's particularly that narrow channel that's the point, for the sea tends to flow erratically in either direction there. Inevitably, therefore, the sea sound will be rather different and indeed 'odd'-seeming to people used to listening to the sea only on any sort of open shore.
Indeed, without the chimes I'd find it a rather unsatisfactory sound in a recording, to listen to for extended periods, but it is real and reasonably 'as heard' there.
2 years ago
Ah, thanks for that @jakemakes. I think you must have deleted a post, and so then I had no means to know what you were originally referring to in your subsequent posts. :-) Anyway, glad you enjoy that recording.
2 years ago
I haven’t made myself clear at all, mate. By edited I meant playing the sounds forward and reversing them which is what it sounded like at times. As I was listening it sounded like the sounds were reversing. I hope that makes sense. But clearly that’s not what you were doing here.
This is good. I shall go to sleep to the sound of it.
2 years ago
Hi there Jakemakes.
In fact the recording *is* very carefully edited, and I assume, unless you indicate otherwise, that you didn't take due note of the 'Advisory' note just above the photos, concerning a possible problem with listening through certain speakers rather than headphones. There's nothing I can do to minimize the phasiness anomaly, short of reverting to no post-recording stereo enhancement, and then accepting the basically atrocious stereo imaging of the PCM-M10. Since early 2016 I've been using the PCM-D100 recorder, which has excellent stero imaging, so that none of its recordings have the sort of problem with sea sounds that you've experienced with this one.
You'd find that it sounds fine through high-grade headphones.
2 years ago
clearly you haven't edited this, I am changing my comment, I am fascinated as to why it sounds like sometimes it is playing in reverse. sometimes the reverberations seem to emanate and others they seem to be getting sucked in..
