We’re extremely proud to announce that we’re hosting a new stage at this year’s Field Day (25th May 2013) – the UK’s best metropolitan music festival. With the music side of things already covered incredibly well (the bill includes Animal Collective, Bat for Lashes, TOY, Stealing Sheep, Daphni, Four Tet, Kurt Vile, Savages and John Cooper Clarke amongst many others), the Caught by the River stage focuses on the very best in spoken word, field recordings and inspirational discussion.

The line up looks like this:

11 – 12: Sounds of London. Recordings from the archive of the London Sound Survey (curated by Ian Rawes)

12: Melissa Harrison, reading from her book, Clay (Bloomsbury, Jan 2013)

1: Rob St. John and Tom Western present the first performance of the work they’ve been doing with Ceri Levy for his Bird Effect film.

1.45: Field Recordings at Field Day: a panel discussion on the art of field recording with guests Chris Watson, Ian Rawes, Rob St. John, Tom Western and Jonny Trunk. Chaired by Cheryl Tipp, curator of the wildlife sound archive at the British Library.

2.30: Jonny Trunk plays the sounds of Basil Kirchin

3: Words on Water: a discussion of all things riverine with John Andrews, Charles Rangeley-Wilson and Luke Jennings

Matthew Herbert in conversation with Luke Turner on the subjects of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop and The Museum of Sound.

4.45: David Hendy presents NOISE: A Human History of Sound and Listening

5.20: A London Sound Quiz hosted by Cheryl Tipp and Ian Rawes

6: Chris Watson’s Nature Disco

To add to that, Caught by the River poet-in-residence Will Burns will read throughout the day and we’ll be on hand to play pastoral music between talks.

Some information on performers and links to their websites:

The UK’s most respected sound recordist, Chris Watson is the man responsible for capturing natural audio in every corner of the Earth for David Attenborough, the BBC and his own release on Touch Records;

Melissa Harrison is a first time author who will be reading from her acclaimed recently published urban nature debut, Clay;

Longterm Caught by the River writer and East London historian John Andrews will chair a words on water discussion (expect everything from fish tales to inspirational local knowledge) with William Hill nominated author Luke Jennings and the angling writer and broadcaster Charles Rangeley-Wilson (who will also be reading from his new book about the evolution of rivers, Silt Road);

Cheryl Tipp (Wildlife Sounds curator at the British Library), Rob St John (musician and field recordist), Tom Western, Ian Rawes (from the London Sound Survey) and Chris Watson will hold a discussion about field recording and archiving the sounds of Britain;

Will Burns – Caught by the River’s poet in residence – will be reading nature inspired poems

Jonny Trunk (Trunk Records, Resonance FM) will play music from the archive of inspirational composer Basil Kirchin, described as ‘the father of ambient music’.