Reading about rocks and picking out the pieces of wood I’m going to be working with over the next month – oh to be able to harness even some of nature’s wisdom and resilience…

My mind has been blown! I’ve just been told about a colossal explosion that took place in Russia in 1908. Apparently, the explosion over the sparsely populated Eastern Siberuab Taiga flattened 2,000 km² (770 sq mi) of forest yet caused no known human casualties. The explosion is classified as an impact event, however, no impact crater has ever been found, and it is thought that the actual impact was caused by the air burst of a meteroid that disintegrated at an altitude of a mere five to ten kilometres (rather than hit the surface of the Earth). More info about it here – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunguska_event

I’m fascinated by the idea that something so epic could take place in outer space, and have an such an enormous impact on the earth and environment. I’m now VERY excited to try to watch BBC Earth’s “Best of 2016” list http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20160706-in-siberia-in-1908-a-huge-explosion-came-out-of-nowhere to find out more about “the explosion that came from nowhere”.

I have this idea to create an almost hyper-real soundscape experience of the creaking sound of old trees, drawing on the folklore associated with enchanted forests, the experience of wisdom passed down by the ‘wise old woods’ that talk – all that contained knowledge. I’ve been giving thought to the kind of trees I’d like to record ‘talking’ – as so many woodland areas in the UK are managed by the Forestry Commission, who are getting rid of a lot of non-indigenous trees, I’d like to record in arboretums and old stately homes in order to capture an ‘international conversation’, as in between indigenous and non-indigenous trees – trees that bring such breadth of perspectives to the ‘conversation’. Perhaps working with arboretums / estates might open up opportunities for exhibition opportunities too, I don’t know, but it’s a thought.