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The joys and horrors of the internet, evoked by stories, sounds and an exciting new electronic and vocal work composed by Kieran Brunt. Opens with an introduction by the composer. 30 years ago, Tim Berners-Lee created the very first website. This powerful edition of Between the Ears explores how the internet has dramatically reshaped our lives over the following three decades. In 1990s Glasgow, a young woman in a physics computer lab glimpses a different future for the world - and herself. In Luton, the web awakens a young man’s Sikh identity - a few years on, it will bring him riches. In 2001, a young mother in France finds escape through Wikipedia. Ten years later, an Austrian law student is horrified when he requests his personal data from Facebook… Over four movements of music and personal stories, the Virtual Symphony moves from sunny optimism to deep disquiet, as our relationship to the internet shifts. Around these stories, composer Kieran Brunt weaves electronic and vocal elements in an exhilarating new musical work commissioned by BBC Radio 3. Kieran Brunt and documentary producer Laurence Grissell worked in close collaboration to produce a unique evocation of the way in which the internet has fundamentally changed how we experience and understand the world. Composer: Kieran Brunt Producer: Laurence Grissell Interviewees: Melissa Terras, Harjit Lakhan, Florence Devouard and Max Schrems Electronics performed by Kieran Brunt Vocals performed by Kieran Brunt, Lucy Cronin, Kate Huggett, Oliver Martin-Smith and Augustus Perkins Ray of the vocal ensemble Shards Programme mixed by: Donald MacDonald Additional music production: Paul Corley Additional engineering: Ben Andrewes

Maria Margaronis surrenders to the life of the hive to explore the ancient folk customs around the telling the bees. The lives of bees and humans have been linked ever since the first hominid tasted a wild hive’s honey. Neither domesticated nor fully wild, honey bees are key to our survival, a barometer of our relationship with nature. Without them, we’d have no fruit, no nuts and seeds, and eventually, no food. No bees; no songbirds. Silent woods. For centuries, we’ve projected stories and beliefs onto these strange, familiar creatures, seeing them as messengers between this world and the next. In this Covid-wracked year, Maria Margaronis explores the old customs of “telling the bees” about a death or significant event, lest they grow angry and leave us. She enters the sonic world of the hive to hear what the bees might be telling us in the company of wise bee guides like Toxteth’s Rastafarian Barry Chang, Mississippi's Ali Pinion, Lithuania's Paulius Chockevicius and young beekeeper Zhivko Todorov in London’s busy Finsbury Park. Others tells us and their bees their significant news. Follow bee tellers and bee callers on a seasonal journey from summer through winter into spring, tuning in to to the hum of the hive and the buzz of the universe. Recorded binaurally. Producer: Mark Burman Additional bee recordings Mark Ferguson

Bogs have always captured the human imagination, inspiring both fear and fiction. Between the Ears wades into this treacherous netherworld in a search for the lost and found. These liminal spaces have a unique and troubling consistency: neither absolutely water, nor absolutely earth, but a potentially dangerous mix between the two. Writers have long been fascinated by the dangerous pull of the bog but also by the secrets that lay buried the peat , from 'The Slough of Despond' in John Bunyan's 'Pilgrim's Progress' to Seamus Heaney's 'Bog Poems' Producer Neil McCarthy and author and former rock climber Jim Perrin attempt to cross a bog called Waun-y-Griafolen in Snowdonia. A living entity, the bog erases paths over time and the duo's navigation becomes as uncertain as the ground beneath them. As they make their way, and as the days fades, they are accompanied by the reflections of Hetta Howes ('Transformative Waters'), Karin Sanders ('Bodies in the Bog'), and artist Mark Daniels who also finds he's strayed from the path. They squelch their way, hoping to understand the bog's contradictory nature before getting swallowed up. Featuring the poem 'Bog Queen' by Seamus Heaney Original composition and sound design by Phil Channell Produced by Neil McCarthy

Composer and sound artist Rob Mackay traces the migratory route of the monarch butterfly, from the Great Lakes in Canada to the forests of Mexico, via the shifting coastal landscape of the eastern shores of Virginia. Along the route of this sonic road-movie Rob meets people working to protect this extraordinary species: Darlene Burgess, a conservation specialist monitoring butterfly populations on the shores of Lake Eerie; Nancy Barnhart, coordinating the monarch migration programme for the Coastal Virginia Wildlife Observatory at Kiptopeke State Park, where we also encounter composer Matthew Burtner, whose sonifications of data from the local seagrass beds help track changes in the monarch's environment; and butterfly expert Pablo Jaramillo-López giving a tour of the Sierra Chincua and Cerro Pelón reserves in Mexico. We also hear reflections from the late Lincoln Brower, the American entomologist whose legacy has inspired many of today's research and conservation efforts. The programme features Rob Mackay's binaural field recordings, and audio from live stream boxes, set up in partnership with the ecological art and technology collective SoundCamp to monitor the monarch's changing habitats. Plus Rob’s own flute playing, recorded in the Mexican forest meadows with David Blink on handpan and trumpet, alongside poetry in Spanish about the monarch by Rolando Rodriguez.

Stories of real life chance encounters, inspired by the 75th anniversary of the much-loved film Brief Encounter. Introduced by Matthew Sweet. Using different recordings of Rachmaninov's Piano Concerto No. 2 - which famously underscores the 1945 film - Between the Ears reflects on how a chance meeting can change our lives forever. In the 1950s two people bump into each other changing trains at Harrow-on-the-Hill station. In 2001, two strangers meet on a train bound for Edinburgh. In 2014 two paths cross in a departure lounge at Toronto Airport. Meanwhile, a few Christmases ago in a pub in Margate eyes meet across a crowded bar. For each person, for good or ill, life will never be the same again. Between the Ears tells their stories, set to Rachmaninov's haunting music. Producer: Laurence Grissell Sound mixed by Donald MacDonald Featuring the voices of: Barry and Maureen Leveton Anna Nation Kähler Kristen Adamson Aoife Hanna Featuring the following recordings of Rachmaninov, Piano Concerto No. 2: Krystian Zimerman, Boston Symphony Orchestra conducted by Seiji Ozawa Leif Ove Andsnes, Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Antonio Pappano Vladimir Ashkenazy, London Symphony Orchestra conducted by André Previn John Ogdon, Philharmonia Orchestra conducted by John Pritchard

The dramatic effects of climate change evoked in words, sounds and a powerful new musical work. Over four movements of rich and evocative music, the listener is transported to the front line of the climate crisis, with stories from coastal Ghana – where entire villages are being swept away by the rising sea – to Norway’s Svalbard archipelago in the high arctic where the ice is melting with alarming speed. The dramatic final movement ponders two contrasting possible outcomes to the crisis. In an ambitious new work originally commissioned by BBC Radio 3 for their Between the Ears strand, Kieran Brunt weaves together electronic, vocal and orchestral elements recorded in isolation by players from the BBC Philharmonic. Each musician recorded their part individually at home and these recordings were then painstakingly combined by sound engineer Donald MacDonald to create a symphonic sound. Documentary producer Laurence Grissell and composer Kieran Brunt have collaborated to produce an ambitious and original evocation of the causes and consequences of rising, warming oceans. Credits Composer: Kieran Brunt Producer: Laurence Grissell Electronics and violin performed by Kieran Brunt Orchestral parts performed by members of the BBC Philharmonic Vocals: Kieran Brunt, Josephine Stephenson & Augustus Perkins Ray of the vocal ensemble Shards Sound mixed by Donald MacDonald Interviewees: Sulley Lansah, BBC Accra Office Hilde Fålun Strøm and Sunniva Sørby, heartsintheice.com Blaise Agresti, former head of Mountain Rescue, Chamonix Blaise Agresti recorded by Sarah Bowen Wildlife recordings by Chris Watson Newsreaders: Susan Rae & Tom Sandars Adverts voiced by Ian Dunnett Jnr, Luke Nunn, Charlotte East, Cecilia Appiah

Angry bulls, furious penguins, enraged seals! In the shadow of the volcano 'Between the Ears' gets a microphone close up to enjoy the action, as veterinarian Jonathan Hollins, gives us a taste of life with the remote animals and sea life of Tristan Da Cunha. On an island of a population of around 250 people, a thousand sheep and many more penguins, Joe also gets a flavour of what happened to the islanders when the volcano last erupted and they were forced to leave their homes, sixty years ago. Cracks in the ground were opening and closing - one sheep fell in! Boats took them to a nearby penguin colony where they sheltered until rescued. Sent to live in the UK , all chose to return to Tristan as soon as it was declared safe by an expeditionary force sent out by The Royal Society. The island was just as they had left it, the settlement miraculously spared, though all the sheep mysteriously disappeared... there are theories as to why! Memories of the volcano are mixed with Joe's daily life - the domestic close up sounds of cows birthing, bulls hoisted onto land from bucking fishing vessels and gong clanging to bring the islanders together. The atmosphere is punctuated by updated versions of traditional sea shanties - performed by the likes of Lou Reed, Anthony, Beth Orton, Rufus Wainwright, Richard Thomson and Tim Robbins. This rocky outcrop was claimed by the Dutch, the British, the Portuguese, and even an American Privateer, geographically useful to all in its splendid isolation, (even in the 20th century the islanders only heard about the ‘result’ of the First World War a year after it finished). Today, we might envy their close community and isolation in a world endangered by today’s globalisation. Joe was lucky to get permission to record during his time there, by the island council, scarred by their previous experiences with the ‘press’, most particularly during that 18 months living as refugees in the UK. From the most remote community in the world – Tristan Da Cunha - the sounds, songs and tales of a whole island committed to socially isolating – together. With grateful thanks to the people of Tristan Da Cunha. Producer: Sara Jane Hall Archive: The Royal Society Volcanic Eruption on Tristan da Cunha, 1961 Music: as sourced by Danny Webb from 'Rogue’s Gallery' - a series of sea shanties and pirate songs. And 'Imaginary Songs From Tristan Da Cunha' by Deathprod.

Before the magic of photography, the dazzle of cinema - there was the diorama. Frenchman Louis Daguerre is known primarily as one of the inventors of photography - but before the magic of light fixed on paper there was the diorama, which some call the precursor to the moving image, and cinema. The Diorama offered the well-heeled audience a glimpse into other worlds… where volcanos would erupt on the hour, Roman ruins explored, mountain peaks ascended… not unlike a modern Las Vegas but in the 1820s. Using light, moving apertures, smoke and mirrors, sound and music, to produce unusually realistic effects, he created a new form of entertainment - immersive, dramatic, sensational, and for a brief period, the wonder of the Western world. From New York to Moscow, Dioramas opened their doors to well-heeled customers who would be so delighted with the ‘realism’ of the created scene, they would frequently ask to be led onto the stage - be it a scene from the Alps, the Battle of Trafalgar, Cowes in the Isle of Wight, or a voyage in search of the North-West Passage. By 1850, nearly all had burnt to the ground, probably due to the large number of oil lamps involved, and the highly flammable nature of the stage props and theatres, but hidden by a Nash façade in Regents Park, London, there stands the last of the Diorama Theatres - a Grade 1 listed building, now sadly empty and awaiting ‘reimagining’. Architect Marek Wojiechowski, who is developing plans for the long empty building, takes him on a tour backstage. Award-winning writer, drama producer and podcast expert Dr Lance Dann gets a chance to visit the original Diorama before setting off on a kaleidoscopic journey through other influential dioramas. He returns to the Denis Severs House in Spitalfields, where he once helped install a sound scape, to bring this detailed recreation of a Huguenot silk weaver’s house, to life. Does the magic still work? Dr Hetta Howes takes him into the immersive atmosphere of Great St Bartholomew’s Church where the worshippers were once drench is sounds, sights and evocative suggestions, and describes the most suggestible of religious texts – the passion meditations. Intriguingly he hears about The Nutshell Studies of Unexplained Death - the murder dioramas created by the brilliant and formidable Chicago heiress Francis Glessner Lee - still used today to teach detectives. Susan Marks has spent a decade researching her - her first film was charmingly titled - The Dolls of Murder, and together they try and solve one of her most famous murder scenes - Barn! Dr Sarah Garfinkle helps us understand how our brains fool us, or decide to play along with immersion, whilst Dr Alistair Good, VR games designer, tempts Dann to jump off a tall building, virtually. Finally Dann visits possibly the last genuine Daguerre diorama in the world – in a small village just outside Paris, Bry-Sur-Marne, where the Mayor Jean Pierre-Spillbauer, and local archivist Vincent Roblin, have dedicated much of the last 20 years trying to restore the small but effective diorama at the back of a provincial church. After contacting Antoine Wilmering at the Getty Foundation, they received a grant of $200,000, matched by the French Government, which saved the last of Daguerre’s dioramas. Producer: Sara Jane Hall Music sourced with the help of Danny Webb.

To view the VR experience in 360 on your smartphone, either click or paste the following link into your search browser: https://youtu.be/RHt6QIJI9cU also available from the GSA SimVis YouTube channel. For the first time, a virtual reality experience and radio documentary will bring to life the ethereal magic of Fingal's Cave - the awesome natural structure on the uninhabited island of Staffa, in the Inner Hebrides of Scotland. Using cutting-edge technology, which captures not only the acoustics of the melodic cave, but its awe-inspiring visual scale and beauty, this Between the Ears takes you to a site of natural beauty that has inspired Felix Mendelssohn, Jules Verne, John Keats, August Strindberg and countless others. Featuring a rich cinematic sound experience, we follow the work of Dr Stuart Jeffrey from The Glasgow School of Art’s School of Simulation and Visualisation, and sound designer and composer, Aaron May, as they both – in their own ways - explore the remarkable Fingal's Cave. A few years ago Stuart and a team of archaeologists from the National Trust for Scotland discovered Bronze Age remains close to the cave and near a 19th century building that was used by early tourists as a shelter from the elements. We join Stuart on location as he continues the dig and unearths further evidence of a Bronze Age site, and we accompany him into the heart of the cave during different sea states. At certain times, the cave actually sounds musical, and this is the reason why local people named it the ‘musical cave’. Stuart explains that inside the cave there is a natural cognitive dissonance that can be very unsettling, indeed some visitors are left feeling on edge. This is because the resonant sounds of blowing and popping, together with booming waves; create a soundscape that does not match the movement of the waves. During the Romantic period, Fingal's Cave attracted much attention and inspired many musicians, artists and literary figures and poets. Felix Mendelssohn made it ashore in 1829 and was so moved by the unearthly sounds that fill the cave he created the remarkable Hebrides Overture in response. Jules Verne said, "the vast cavern with its mysterious, dark, weed-covered chambers and marvellous basaltic pillars produced upon me a most striking impression and was the origin of my book, Le Rayon Vert”. During the 19th-century era of romanticism and the sublime, the Germans were particularly enthralled by Fingal’s Cave. Not only did they visit, but quirky plays and stories were even set there (including Bride of the Isles about vampires living inside Fingal's Cave). The location’s rich mythology, including that of mermaids and giants, highlights the sublime aspect of the place. Stuart's wider research, a collaboration with Professor Sian Jones at the University of Stirling, is trying to fill in the gap between how the Romantics viewed it - a site of awe - and how we see it today. “We have become dull souls, seeing it only as a nature reserve,” he says. Stuart hopes to change that perception by investigating whether cutting-edge technology can capture a place’s very essence. And this is where composer Aaron May comes into this story. Whereas Stuart has spent many hours within the magnificent natural structure, Aaron has never set foot in Fingal’s Cave. But for this documentary he has created a new musical composition based upon his experience of entering a phenomenally exact virtual reality reconstruction, made by Stuart and his team at Glasgow School of Art. The VR version, features laser scans, photogrammetry and acoustic sound maps. You are able to tour the entire length of the cave and even hear how a piece of music would sound if played within it. A version of this virtual reality experience, complete with Aaron’s composition, will be made available for listeners to explore on their smart phones. And of course, Aaron’s remarkable and evocative soundtrack will feature in the radio documentary. Listeners will be able to access a version of the VR experience using their smart phones and a high-end version, running on an HTC Vive, will showcase at the Edinburgh Festivals in August 2019. For those unable to make the trip to Staffa, it’s the nearest you will get to experiencing the full majesty of the location. To view the VR experience in 360 on your smartphone, paste the following link into your search browser: https://youtu.be/RHt6QIJI9cU Producer: Kate Bissell With thanks to: Composer Aaron May Dr Stuart Jeffrey from the School of Simulation and Visualisation at The Glasgow School of Art Derek Alexander from The National Trust for Scotland Professor Sian Jones from the University of Stirling Shona Noble Aura Bockute Singing in Aaron’s composition by Heloise Werner and David Ridley

Is karaoke the modern sea shanty? Containers are the nearly invisible carriers of 90% of the goods on earth – yet we know so little about them, or the people on board. The crew who power globalisation, are unsung heroes. Now we hear them sing, and capture something of that strange, lonely, heroic life. Sea shanties are a relic of the past – today it’s far more likely to be karaoke soothing the soul and powering the arm of the modern sea farer. Instead nearly all ships have a karaoke machine on board - and rumour has it, competition is ferocious. In search of the modern sea shanty, Nathaniel Mann, award winning singer and song collector, who has long avoided taking part in karaoke, boards a state-of-the-art container ship in Gdansk shipyard… the Maribo Maersk, to sing along with the Filipino sea men, ship's cook Valiente, and able-seaman Ariel. He also ‘plays the ship’ - discovering acoustic possibilities from the engine room to the Monkey Island (the platform above the bridge), attaching contact microphones which revel the rhythms hidden behind heavy metal walls. He climbs out on the 'catwalk' to watch the stevedores at work, the giant cranes crashing a container into the hold every two minutes, 24 hours a day - until all 18,272 have been shifted - with all the complexity of a game of Tetrus. The company offers mainly 5 month contracts to the 20 or so sailors on board, and discovering how the team pass those months at sea, Nathaniel hears tales of home-sickness, made even more poignant by the choice of songs the crew prefer to sing. We hear from an international crew about life at sea in this giant vessel – you can’t even hear the sea from the decks above. Tales of dark skies, longed for loved ones, learning the shape of the world from water - we hear a fluid mix of the sounds of the ship, the crew singing karaoke, and Nathan's own new songs, gleaned from his observations on board. We also hear from Suffolk shanty singers Des and Jed, who wonder if karaoke might be an updated version of an older form of shanty. About the presenter: Nathaniel Mann is an experimental composer, sound artist, performer and sound designer - known both for his experimental trio Dead Rat Orchestra, and most recently as embedded composer at the Pitt Rivers Museum. He also won the Arts Foundation's 25th Anniversary Fellowship 2018. In 2015 he won the George Butterworth Prize for Composition, and much of his experience as an accomplished and imaginative percussive master, as well as singer, will be integral to this programme - a symphony of singing, the sea, the ships and the songsters. Producer: Sara Jane Hall With thanks to the crew of the Maribo Maersk, especially: Chief Officer: Morten Fløjborg Hansen CPT: Stig Lindegaard Mikkelsen 2nd Officer: Francis Umbay Dela Cerna 4th Engineer: Campbell John Dooley Chief Cook: Valiente Panopio Peralta AB: Ariel Dallarte Martin

Julia Hollander, her brother Tom and father Tony tell the story of a letter from the BBC, which saved their family, spawning a rich legacy of Czech music in the UK. March 1939. Broadcaster Hans Hollander, grandfather of writer and musician Julia and actor Tom, receives a letter that becomes his family's passport to freedom. The BBC's KA Wright invites Hans to come to London to discuss Janacek and the whole of question of Czech music asking, 'How soon do you think you could come, and how long would you be able to stay?' After years of trying to fall in with the anti-Semitic bureaucracy, the Hollanders fear for the future; the letter offers them a possible escape. On 15 March 1939 - the day Hitler's tanks roll into Prague - they take the train from Brno, constantly in terror, watching as people they know are taken off the train by the Gestapo. The BBC letter is enough to effect safe passage to Britain. Once there Hans and Kenneth Wright share their passion for Czech music with Wright orchestrating the Bohemian folk songs Hans brought with him from his homeland. Julia Hollander goes in search of KA Wright to discover an unlikely saviour. An outsider driven by artistic curiosity and a passionate belief in the international language of music. She seeks out and revives the music Kenneth and Hans made together, and Tom reads from his grandfather's letters. Janacek's 'In The Mists' is performed by Julia Hollander, KA Wright's 'Nocturne' is played by Peter McMullin, and 'Bohemia' sung by Julia Hollander with accompaniment by Peter McMullin, an expert in KA Wright's music. Hans Hollander's letters, translated by Anne Varty, are read by Tom Hollander. Producer Dixi Stewart, with assistance from Hannah Dean and Mark Burman.

The magical North Pennines landscape of deaf shepherd-poet Josephine Dickinson, which inspires her life and work and is the fertile backdrop to her real and imagined sound world. Welcome to her remote hill farm near Alston – near the highest market town in England – where Josephine looks after her sheep and writes her poetry. It’s her in-between land, a place between hearing and deafness, art and reality, home and you listening to the programme. It’s a challenging environment, too: in 2018 the ‘Beast from the East’ cut the local community off and emergency aid had to be airlifted in by Chinook helicopter, but in the spring the wildflower meadows are alive to the sound of curlews, lambs and bumble bees. This peat landscape is ever-present in her life and increasingly a source of inspiration for her environmentalism. Born in London, Josephine moved here in 1994 and fell in love with the moors - and with Douglas, an elderly sheep farmer who took her under his wing and married her. Josephine’s deafness started at the age of six, but hearing aids enabled her to pursue her love of music, and she taught piano and worked as an arts development worker at the South Bank. But seven years ago she lost her hearing completely, plunging her into a hallucinatory inner soundscape that tormented and fascinated her in equal measure. She can now hear her lambs and the wind in the cotton grass, thanks to a cochlear implant. In collaboration with BBC Radio 3 and sonic artist Andrew Deakin - from Full of Noises, based in Barrow - Josephine invited local people to share her Ark of Sound in Alston Parish Church, a powerful sound installation demonstrating that a deaf person doesn’t live in a silent world. Produced by Andrew Carter A BBC Radio Cumbria Production

The patterns and flows of life in the NHS captured in immersive stereo, with specially commissioned music sung by NHS staff and The Bach Choir. In the maternity unit at Birmingham's Heartlands Hospital, the heart rate of an unborn child gives cause for concern. Across town at Queen Elizabeth Hospital, patients with critical heart conditions are closely monitored hour by hour. Downstairs in A&E, staff begin their shift not knowing what awaits them. Between the Ears marks the 70th anniversary of the NHS with a unique composition depicting two Birmingham hospitals as they care for patients from cradle to grave. In four movements, the rhythms of the health service are accompanied by a special choral work written by award winning composer Alex Woolf, an alumnus of the BBC's Proms Inspire Scheme. The NHS Symphony is recorded in binaural stereo which simulates how the human ear hears sounds. For a fully immersive experience, the programme is best listened to on headphones. The Bach Choir are joined by members of the Barts Choir, the Lewisham & Greenwich NHS Choir and the Royal Free Music Society Choir Conductor: Mark Austin Solo soprano: Julia Blinko Composer/pianist: Alex Woolf Producer: Laurence Grissell.

You can never see through someone else's eyes, but can we, by stealth, tap into people's visual imaginations? The mind's eye is something most of us take for granted - the 'secret cinema' inside our mind, turning sounds into shapes, characters into faces - it sometimes seems like a sixth sense. For those who have it. Constantly viewing our own personal visuals, we are powerless to control it, and no one else can see it but us. "A man hitting his head with a bible" or "A tree being chopped down"? "A row of frogs" or "The bulging eyes of Malcolm McDowell in A Clockwork Orange" Using a series of soundscapes, we hear the visual musings of a range of people: an architect, a school boy, a DJ, an artist amongst them - playing with the way people's own personal experiences influence their mental pictures. But what about those who have no pictures in their brain? "In my late 20's I was on a management course doing a relaxation exercise, and they asked us to imagine dawn. And I thought dawn? Well I know it's pink. But I couldn't see it, I couldn't imagine it." Gill Morgan, doctor First recognised, but not named in 1880 by Francis Galton, aphantasia, as Professor of Cognitive and Behavioural Neurology Adam Zeman has recently called it, is being explored by neuroscientists around the world. It may affect 2% of the population, and studies have shown that there is a sliding scale of non-imagers. Some barely notice any difference in their relationship with their own personal history, but for others this may include an inability to recall life events. "From talking to close friends it became obvious to me that 'the mind's eye' was not a figure of speech, phrases like, 'it takes you back' exist because that's what they do". Nick Watkins, theoretical physicist Encouraging Radio 3 listeners to become aware of their own 'secret cinema', 'Between The Ears' trepans into the little grey cells that bring imagination to light - giving a glimpse inside the film-reel unspooling in our brains. Contributors: Professor Adam Zeman, Doctor Nick Watkins, Dame Gill Morgan, Michael Bywater The voices of Susan Aldworth, Francesca Vinti, Luca Goodfellow, Emma Kilbey, Ford Hickson, Ian Goodfellow, Danny Webb and readings by John Dougall and Dilly Barlow. Soundscapes featuring Alexander Frater in Goa in the monsoon Artwork by kind permission of artist Susan Aldworth. Music sourced by Danny Webb. Producer: Sara Jane Hall.

When Ken Hollings underwent surgery at Moorfields Hospital for a detached retina he experienced an unexpected symphony inside his head, right between the ears. The sounds have haunted him ever since. Musician Martin McCarrick also found himself in a terrifying and unsettling world of head noise that began with a perforated eardrum and ended in a rare medical condition. He too has never forgotten the unexpected world of noise he heard between his ears and has set about recreating it. In this binaural edition of Between the Ears Ken Hollings goes in search of his primal sound. Producer: Mark Burman

What's the difference between the sheep found in art and real sheep? In a sheep bell-rich melange, we go in hunt of the real thing, with sheep farmer, author of world best-seller "Driving Over Lemons" and ex-Genesis member Chris Stewart, and academic, writer and potential Bo-Peeper Alexandra Harris. Those famous shepherds watching their flocks by night were, of course, following in a great tradition - guarding sheep, leading them to pasture, and then probably killing their babies - just like Able, the first shepherd. From ancient times, the shepherd and the sheep they care for, have been the most consistent of rural sights - they appear in poetry, plays and painting, inaccurately, romanticised, and highly symbolic. The closest Alexandra Harris has been to real sheep has been wandering past a few woolly bundles on the South Downs. She is, of course, more familiar with the Pastoral in art - from the Greek idyll to Shakespeare's 'A Winter's Tale'. To her - 'shepherding suggests knowing the real facts of life, wisdom of all time coming down through the ages'. Chris Stewart, who left the UK 25 years ago to pursue a new life as a shepherd in Spain, has 40-plus years of shepherding under his belt. He is more than familiar with the sheep's ways - their smells, herd mentality, incontinence and vulnerability. He knows how to feed one, find one and kill one, when necessary, although he still loves them dearly. To help Alexandra get to grips with the reality of the pastoral life, Chris suggests 'get your own flock of sheep and become a shepherdess....' Enter Paco - hardy Alpujarran mountain shepherd, bachelor and philosopher - although when asked what he thinks about whilst watching his flocks all day, he can only answer 'No, pienso nada!' Let the sheep bells fly.... Producer Sara Jane Hall Music Sheepwrecked - from the traditional Combined with Yan Tan Tether (Trad) And Mangare Peformed by Nathaniel Mann Count Your Blessings (instead of Sheep) sung by Bing Crosby Poets Edmund Spencer Sir Walter Raleigh Read by Richard Burton Sheep and bells Recording on location in Olias and El Valero, Alpujarra mountains, Spain, and Shearwell Farm, Exmouth Extra baas from a biscuit tin

The detection of Gravitational Waves in 2015 was hailed as an astounding breakthrough in the world of physics and a triumph for the. LIGO project, the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory. But the discovery was also a triumph for the men and women who had worked at LIGO during tumultuous times. DREVER, LIGO, is the poet Robert Crawford's meditation on the Scottish physicist Ronald Drever, and his role in the search for Gravitational Waves. Music by Jeremy Thurlow. Producer: David Stenhouse.

The three second rule - once more like folklore or hearsay - has been discovered to be the happiest condition for the human brain. In this imaginative journey through the synapses a work, rest and play - Susan Aldworth, Artist in Residence at York University, slips inside a scanner, under the suprvision of neuroscientists Professor Miles Whittington, and Dr Fiona LeBeau, who she has been working with on a project exploring sleep, to discover whether paying heed to the three second rhythm of the mind can help us work rest and play. By the time you finish this sentence you will have made up your mind. You don't know it yet but the three second rule governs your life. There is a brain pulse, a sequence of internal events that repeats every three seconds. This also applies to poems and music, even Beethoven's Fifth. The repetition of phrases three seconds long is easily grasped. Sentence interpretation is also best understood at three seconds. It seems that the rule applies also when we are chilling out. We turn our thoughts inside as we daydream away. Whether we are choosing a lover, Reading a poem, painting a picture, or singing, It seems that maybe we all operate this way. Our attention span working in bursts of time. In this programme we will hear a brain working. mixed with the musings of actor Michelle Newell, We will build up a sound world of three second pulses. Get a rhythm of irresistible beats going in the listener. In the brain of Susan Aldworth, artist and printmaker. With the mind of Simon Townley, musician and composer, The wiles of dating coach Shaun (aka Discovery), and Professor Miles Whitingdon, Dr Fiona LeBeau, Dr Kai Alter. If you've made your mind up to listen by now, I hope you choose well. Producer: Sara Jane Hall.

'Hey man, you're living my dream...!' The cry rings out once, twice a day from people who catch sight of the shanty boat as it wends its way down the back waters of the USA. Hand built out of reclaimed redwood by artist, anarchist, and surprisingly practical river boat captain Wes Modes - his aura is that of a modern day Huck Finn, his shipmates are friends and lovers and 'Good dog Hazel' is always on the couch, on guard, or under the table. In a rich tapestry of watery atmosphere, frustration, intimacy, fear and pleasure, we hear a slipping, sliding adventure, where the smell of pancakes, the slap of water and the smoke of cigars wafts over the waters of Americas great rivers. On his travels Wes records the stories of people on the river for his 'Secret History' project. He's met shanty boat dwellers from the '20s and '30s, including Anita Smith Cobb who recalls her sister finding Tennessee pearls on the river, and a violent encounter with a wild cat, and Betty Goines who once shot two intruders when she was a child guarding the boat. In between stories we hear his views on billionaire worship - sometimes in language not for the fainthearted - and how an artist and an anarchist fits into America today. But living the dream on the shanty boat isn't always straightforward... Perhaps there would be engine problems; perhaps flames would lick the side of the raft and the local police take an extra interest... Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps... A wide screen, extravagantly rich textured tale of risk, romance, and tested tempers. Producer: Sara Jane Hall Special Effects: Barney Quinton.

'The old pagan gods, when ousted by Christianity, took refuge in the rivers, where they still dwell' - Old English saying David Bramwell has a fascination and fear of water. He grew up by a water tower, close to the heart of Doncaster: a place of mystery and wonder to him, the highest building in the area, almost a kind of temple. 'We have wandered too far from some vital totem, something central to us that we must find our way back to, following a hair of meaning' - Alan Moore With deep thought from cult author Alan Moore, the witches of Sheffield, ex-steel workers and the conservationists of Yorkshire, musician David Bramwell plunges into the river Don to celebrate its return to health and the revival of the worship of its goddess, Danu - the river's original name from pre-Roman times. It's also an underwater musical experience for the listener... blending the sounds of the rivers, canals and streams of the Don, recorded with hydrophones, into new music, new sounds, with Bramwell's compositions. Bramwell travels up the Don to its source, backwards in time, uncovering the history of its days as an industrial heartland, now a regenerated river - banked by forests of figs and swum through by deer. He meets John Heaps who, as a teenager in the 1970s at the steel works, was instructed to throw cyanide in the river by the bucket-load; takes a boat with Professor Ian Rotherham, of Sheffield Hallam University, who guides him through the decaying, yet reviving industrial landscape of the city; hunts fresh fish with river expert Chris Firth of the Don Catchment River Trust; stares up at Vulcan on the Town Hall roof, the harsh overlord of industry, with folklorist and lecturer David Clarke; and hears from witches Anwen and Lynne Harling (also an archaeologist, handily), trying to bring back recognition for the goddess of the river. But this is also a mystical journey - searching out the 'spirit of this dark and lonely water', in an attempt to come to peace with Bramwell's own fear, perhaps to atone for the wrongs committed to Danu by Vulcan, in the name of progress and industrialisation. Going under, with Between the Ears. Producer: Sara Jane Hall Music and words performed, written and presented by David Bramwell. Clips from Lonely Water (1973) from The COI Collection, courtesy BFI National Archive. The film can be view on the BFI player, see link below.