WOPAM 2024
Our second year
Thank you to our collaborators, out on the water now, making this years collective effort happen.
The WOPAM Project started in 2023 with 150 researchers coming together to record aquatic sounds across 300 different locations, all around the world, on a single day. We are back this year for WOPAM 2024 recording at over 400 locations around the world.
Delving into Bioacoustics
This year, researchers all around the world will continue to contribute to a growing global dataset from which we will collaboratively analyze trends and patterns, explore unknowns, and showcase the ongoing work being done within our community. Our collaborators explore how biology, technology and acoustics come together to better understand our changing oceans and the species within them.
A song from WOPAM sounds
This year for WOPAM 2024, Colombian musician and producer Alejandro Bernal composed an original song using only sounds from recordings made during the collective WOPAM effort in 2023. He called it,
Primero estaba el mar - In the beginning was the sea
"Once I have all these sounds, the fun begins. Many of them are very musical and suggest rhythmic structures that I can start to use in the composition. Initially, I start creating loops with different sounds that create interesting grooves. Then comes a process of editing and audio manipulation to recreate melodic or percussive sounds. But all the sounds we hear are underwater sounds".
"It is very interesting and motivating to be part of the WOPAM project. As a producer and experimental musician, having access to these sounds to create music is a privilege and connects very directly with my intentions as an artist". Alejandro Bernal has worked on projects that interweave science and art based on "points of encounter" with bioacoustics, soundscapes, field recordings. He has explored how we can use these experiences to create works of art, but also address some of the environmental issues these environments, habitats, and species face.
This song was supported by the Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS), Dr Ben Gottesman was a key conceptual contributor and a special thank you to our WOPAM contributors Sierra Jarriel, Erin Ross-Marsh, Ivan Hinojosa, Michelle Havlik & Xavier Mouy.
