I wake up in the same state of bewilderment and with the same anxieties as everybody – not knowing what the day’s news will hold. The way I’ve seen my job during this time is to play the right music that hopefully will take people’s minds off the situation, even if just for a few moments. I don’t think that the audience and radio have ever been closer. We are all in this together.
I’m based at Media City in Salford. On a regular workday, the buzz here is great. Lots of like-minded people working in a similar world for the BBC and ITV. At the moment, like everywhere, it’s so quiet and makes for a more reflective, contemplative time.
We are hearing the world differently. The first sounds I hear each morning are birds singing and very occasionally, if he arrives before I leave for work, the chink of milk bottles being left on my doorstep. Like a lot of people in lockdown we’ve got a milk delivery and that sound is a reminder of being a kid.
During these times, noises that may have blended into the background are bringing us joy and hope. I have been asking 6 Music listeners to share the sounds that make them happy at the start of their day. We’ve had hundreds of sounds sent, including a huge amount of birdsong, as you might expect. Cuckoos and owls have been very common, and it’s surprising the number of woodpeckers we’ve had – maybe woodpeckers are making a comeback. The sound of nature is comforting, it’s soothing. They are the sounds that connect us all together.
That’s what we’re all hoping for, that every single day brings us closer to normality
Then there are sounds around the house that people are picking up on in their quieter homes. With no rush to school or work, people are hearing their coffee percolating, the rhythmic rumble of breadmakers, dogs panting, gravel crunching, rain on skylights. There are parents, who usually have to leave early for work, waking up with their child for the very first time. They have been sending sounds of their babies gurgling and laughing.
Composer and multi-instrumentalist Erland Cooper has woven the recordings into a contemporary track, Sounds of Change. He and I had a long conversation about the way that the world is right now and tried to find a way to reflect most people’s state of mind, to document a time that for so many has been so hard while trying to turn that into something more positive and uplifting.