Is it possible to hear the sound of Louisville’s historic and current housing policies? Why Beecher Terrace was built, who lives there, what is being lost with it, and what’s coming next are all hot button issues. While bringing human voices to the debate across the city, we pause to listen to the environment itself. To hear the full recording, explore the sound map, or submit a sound visit www.wfpl.org/sounds or www.kentuckianasounds.org.

Kentuckiana Sounds curator Aaron Rosenblum stops to listen to the chorus of insects by a grassy lot in Okolona. This sound was recorded while he was artist-in-residence as part of the South Central Regional Library’s COLLIDER arts program. To hear the full recording, explore the sound map, or submit a sound visit www.wfpl.org/sounds or www.kentuckianasounds.org.

When archivist and musician Heather Fox heard a new sound behind her house, she set out her iPhone to capture it. Somewhere out there in the drizzly darkness, as her cats and dog wandered and crickets called, frogs of a species new to her backyard were calling. To hear the full recording, explore the sound map, or submit a sound visit www.wfpl.org/sounds or www.kentuckianasounds.org.

Dan Bryan has always been interested in sound. When he walks down Bardstown Road, he hears a voice calling out as if from the ether, with a clear message: it’s safe to cross. Less clear is who’s doing the talking on Louisville’s Accessible Pedestrian Signals. To hear the full recording, explore the sound map, or submit a sound visit www.wfpl.org/sounds or www.kentuckianasounds.org.

Editor and musician Brian Manley used to sit out on his back porch on Preston St. to take in the sounds of the evening. Sometimes his block was alive with animals, insects, and humans. Other times it was mostly quiet. But either way, the regular passage of planes headed for a landing at Standiford Field provided a rhythmic soundtrack from above. To hear the full recording, explore the sound map, or submit a sound visit https://wfpl.org/sounds or www.kentuckianasounds.org.

They’re four-and-a-half feet tall, their wingspans can reach up to seven feet, and their raucous call can be heard from two-and-a-half miles away. Every year, thousands of sandhill cranes stop through Kentucky and Indiana on their way from Florida to the upper Midwest and Canada. To hear the full recording, explore the sound map, or submit a sound visit https://wfpl.org/sounds or www.kentuckianasounds.org.

Auctioneer-in-training, musician, and square dance caller Alex Udis recorded the 2018 World Championship Dainty Contest that takes place just down the street from his home. The contest is a meeting place for friends old and new, and a test of skills for competitors 45 and older. Just make sure you don’t miss your turn when the announcer calls your name! To hear the full recording, explore the sound map, or submit a sound visit https://wfpl.org/sounds or www.kentuckianasounds.org. +

Biking through downtown one night, Kentuckiana Sounds curator Aaron Rosenblum heard something odd while stopped at a red light. A chorus of katydids and crickets in the bushes and trees seemed to be engaged in a dialogue with the synthetic bird calls of the audible crosswalks signals that aid visually impaired pedestrians. Did the insects register the sound of the signals? Were they responding to it? To hear the full recording, explore the sound map, or submit a sound visit www.wfpl.org/sounds or www.kentuckianasounds.org.

Musician and former railroad engineer John Paul Wright lives where Bardstown Road and Baxter Avenue meet. That’s where he captured the eerie, once-a-month coincidence of the noon bells of St. Brigid’s Catholic Church tolling at the same time as the monthly test of the Jefferson County civil defense siren system. Both sounds are significant for Wright, and tied to meaningful memories. To hear the full recording, explore the sound map, or submit a sound visit www.wfpl.org/sounds or www.kentuckianasounds.org.

Kentuckiana Sounds curator Aaron Rosenblum shares a recording made on a country road outside of New Albany, Indiana on a late spring evening. The surroundings are a mix of forest, field, and meadow, and an evening chorus of birds, insects, and amphibians brings Aaron back to his childhood in upstate New York. To hear the full recording, explore the sound map, or submit a sound visit www.wfpl.org/sounds or www.kentuckianasounds.org.