Martin is a field recordist and teacher. Inspired by his work with young people, particularly those in care, Martin established HomeSounds in 2016. Martin’s research-informed project invites everyone, particularly young people, to become active environmental listeners for the benefit of their creativity, education, health, and wellbeing.  

Martin Scaiff has collaborated with partners from across the fields of education, care, conservation, heritage, health, and wellbeing through short and long-term engagement work with environmental sound. These collaborations have included in-person and online soundwalks, the installation of live-streaming microphones, presentations, workshops, listening groups, after-school clubs, interviews, field recording, performances, holiday clubs and citizen science projects.  

Scaiff has released nine albums of field recordings, performances, interviews, and installations. These reflect the project’s diverse interest in environmental sound, and consider sound’s impact on creativity, ideas, community, education, communication, conservation, health, wellbeing, climate change, environment, and social justice, particularly in relation to young people.  

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“As part of my residency, I have been sound walking between every Suffolk library for the Seconds of Sound (S.O.S project). On these walks, I recorded and live streamed the acoustic habitats I travelled through, inviting others to walk with me (either in person or remotely), and delivering active environmental listening activities however, whenever, and wherever, I can. After each walk, I have brought the sounds I have recorded together into a collection that will become part of Suffolk Libraries’ lending stock.  

As environmental sound is commonly an aspect of our lives that is borderless and beyond our control (think of traffic or industrial noise) we often take back control by creating individual acoustic habitats, increasingly through technology but also by isolating ourselves in other ways. This isolation has consequences for the natural world. As our encounters with the infinite richness and complexity of natural sound decrease, the appreciation of its influence and importance declines in equal measure. Through technology we can listen to environmental sound from all over the world like never before, but in a search for meaning, the basis of caring, nothing beats actively listening for a few seconds to wherever you are, whenever you can, right now!”  (Martin Scaiff)