The Great Animal Orchestra by Bernie Krause

The Great Animal Orchestra by Bernie Krause gives us a new look at all of the sounds that nature makes and surrounds us with – if we would only stop and listen. This book will take you on a journey with sounds in nature that even though you can’t hear through the pages, does make you appreciate it.

Book Description

“Musician and naturalist Bernie Krause is one of the world's leading experts in natural sound, and he's spent his life discovering and recording nature's rich chorus. Searching far beyond our modern world's honking horns and buzzing machinery, he has sought out the truly wild places that remain, where natural soundscapes exist virtually unchanged from when the earliest humans first inhabited the earth.

Krause shares fascinating insight into how deeply animals rely on their aural habitat to survive and the damaging effects of extraneous noise on the delicate balance between predator and prey. But natural soundscapes aren't vital only to the animal kingdom; Krause explores how the myriad voices and rhythms of the natural world formed a basis from which our own musical expression emerged.

From snapping shrimp, popping viruses, and the songs of humpback whales-whose voices, if unimpeded, could circle the earth in hours-to cracking glaciers, bubbling streams, and the roar of intense storms; from melody-singing birds to the organ-like drone of wind blowing over reeds, the sounds Krause has experienced and describes are like no others. And from recording jaguars at night in the Amazon rain forest to encountering mountain gorillas in Africa's Virunga Mountains, Krause offers an intense and intensely personal narrative of the planet's deep and connected natural sounds and rhythm.

The Great Animal Orchestra is the story of one man's pursuit of natural music in its purest form, and an impassioned case for the conservation of one of our most overlooked natural resources-the music of the wild. ” – The Great Animal Orchestra

My Thoughts

The Great Animal Orchestra is an interesting book. Going outside into the forest or even on a walk around your neighborhood, you hear tons of sounds and music that the animals provide for us. However, most of the time, we don’t hear it. Either we’re listening to an MP3 player, or just not paying attention. This book makes you want to start paying attention and listening to nature, and for that I really appreciate this book.

Although we can’t hear any of the cool sounds of animals and nature that the author describes throughout the text, he does a fantastic job narrating his travels and things he has heard to make us feel like we’re there, too.

I found this book to be incredibly thought provoking, and really makes me want to take a stand help with conservationism with nature, too. I hate seeing wildlife destroyed and ruining the natural state that was there because we humans came in to try and fix what didn’t need to be changed. I recommend this book for everyone who also wants to save nature and also for those who appreciate music in its purest form.

* Thank you to the publisher of The Great Animal Orchestra, Little, Brown and Company, for providing me with a copy of this book for review. All opinions expressed are my own.