The Sounds of a Dying Glacier Might Make You Cry

From trippy mushroom synths to the stressed-out "pops" of thirsty plants, recording the music of nature has long resulted in soundscapes both fascinating and moving.

A new recording of a melting glacier in the Swiss Alps, however, goes over the line right into devastation. Recorded by French sound artist Ludwig Berger at the rapidly-retreating Morteratsch glacier in the upper part of the Swiss Alps, the "Crying Glacier" project is exactly what the name suggests: the documentation of an ancient structure's last breaths.

In a short documentary of the same name that was produced by the Danish studio El Flamingo and plugged by the New York Times, "Crying Glacier" comes at you in a rush. With its rapid babbling liquid noises that can sound more like a cheery brook than a dying ice behemoth, Morteratsch's creaks and ticks sound almost like trees.

 

Midway through the short film, all the sounds and feelings gleaned from the glacier — the brightness of flowing water, the small air bubble pops that Berger explains are hundreds or even thousands of years old, the levity brought on by the flatulent sounds of gas being released, and that preternatural creaking — dovetail into a crescendo.

That initial bustling busyness turns to gloom as the glacier starts to sound almost like it's drowning. By the time you realize what you're hearing in that Arctic symphony, it's too late to turn back.

"The more alive the glacier seems," Berger said in the documentary, "the more the glacier is actually dying."

Along with the documentary, which clocks in just under 10 minutes but feels like an hours-long tragedy by the time it's over, the field recorder also released on Bandcamp a standalone track titled "on a different scale"  that documents the same phenomena in a different medium.

Listed as the composers are Berger and "Vadret da Morteratsch," the Swiss version of the glacier's name; the track also captures the symphonic soliloquy of an ancient structure merging faster and faster with the frigid sea surrounding it.

Like any good symphonic tragedy, "Crying Glacier" was seemingly edited to espouse a narrative. From its quietly cheery introduction to its dramatic denouement and meditative conclusion, this project documented something as beautiful as it is melancholic: the sounds of a glacier, a stand-in for our planet, as it gasps for a life that is slipping away.

More on glacial retreat: Antarctic Glacier Accused of "Ice Piracy"