This page has sound recordings from my
travels to South Africa and Namibia.

All recordings...

M/S Stereo

Shure VP88
Sound Devices MP2
Fostex FR2








Storm Rolling in on Verandah                01:57
    Recorded off the back verandah of Mundulea House on Karongwe Reserve in Limpopo Province where I lived.  This is the beginning of a huge storm coming in.  We recorded greater than 100mm of rain on the gauge the next morning.

Blackbacked Jackal 
                       07:39
    We camped one evening at Nakluft View near Sesriem, Namibia on the edge of the Namib
    Desert, the oldest desert in the world.  At about midnight we began to hear jackal calling
    around of campground and I went up onto a plateau near our campsite to record one of
    them.  There were thousands of giant armoured ground crickets crawling along the ground
    as well and it was all I could do keep quiet as they slowly walked across my feet as I held
    the microphone.

Giant Eagle Owl                        01:41
    Here is a recording of a lovely huge, pale grey, pink eyed juvenile Giant Eagle Owl.  He or
    she is perched nearby up in a Leadwood Tree on Karongwe Reserve.

African Penguins                        02:14
    At Boulders Beach on the Cape Peninsula there is a colony of about 3000 African Penguins,
    the largest colony on mainland Africa.  You’ll hear why these birds were called Jackass
    Penguins until very recently.  Just down the road from where these penguins were
    recorded is a portion of the beach where humans are allowed to swim in the bay along with the penguins.  So fun.

Male Impala Fighting                        01:49
    Two young male impala going at it to test their mettle and secure their mates.

Matabele Ants                            01:25
    A swarm of Matabele Ants communicating.  I can only assume they are planning their next
    raid on a termite mound.  You cannot hear this strange squeaking from 6 feet off the ground,
    but when you lower your ear, or your microphone to ant level this sound is surprisingly loud.

Caterpillars Eating Marula Tree                02:10
    Probably the strangest ambient sound I’ve heard yet.  This subtle clicking you hear is
    actually made by caterpillars.  The caterpillars will attack a tree and over the course of a
    few days, will eat all the leaves off the tree.  This tree is a Marula Tree on Karongwe
    Reserve and the clicking sound is actually their feces hitting the tree on its way to the ground.  Weird.

Baboons                            01:18
    A group of Baboons up in some trees recorded from Mundulea House on Karongwe Reserve.

Elephant Charge                        01:40
    My hairiest moment in South Africa.  While on research drive one afternoon on Karongwe,
    we drove up a road and inadvertently between the elephant herd and the Matriarch of the
    herd.  In her own way, she let us know that we were not in a spot that she approved of. 
    While normally we would stand firm in our truck when an Elephant approached, this
    encounter found us deciding it best to speed in reverse away from her as quickly as we could. 
    She came charging at us full tilt and trumpeting to boot.  She was within about 3 meters of
    our truck before she stopped running.

Lion Vocalizing                        01:22

    Just a short piece of a lion relaxing and stretching on the reserve.

Lions Eating 1                            04:33
    These two recordings are of a group of three lions tucking into a baby giraffe which they had
    only just taken down and killed.  You’ll hear them chewing on bone, tearing skin, breathing
    and gulping and swallowing.  We were lucky enough to sit for 2 hours only 10 meters away
    from this scene during a beautiful sundown on Karongwe.

Lions Eating 2                            02:19

Roar 1                                01:02
    These four tracks are various roaring sequences.  Rather than aggressive roars, these are
    contact calls to let others know where they are and to request a response for reciprocal
    information.  They are all at night and feature two lions roaring at once.  The 3rd track is
    an edited piece of a roar as the beginning was too loud for the recorder.

Roar 2                                01:03
Roar 3                                00:56
Roar 4                                00:45







This section consists entirely of recordings of a man named Goodman singing on a street corner in downtown Cape Town.  Goodman is blind and busks most afternoons.  He plays in open tuning with a similar chord structure for all of his songs.  He also plays the guitar in an unusual position sitting and holding the guitar upright and facing him and barring the chords with his thumb only.  While his songs are simple I believe there is something pure and driven about his performance.


GOODMAN/I Come to Thee #1                04:30
GOODMAN/I Come to Thee #2                03:32
GOODMAN/In the Flood                           04:30
GOODMAN/Lord is Coming #1                03:03
GOODMAN/Lord is Coming #2                05:02
GOODMAN/I am the way                           02:36
GOODMAN/Marching to Zion                   04:40
GOODMAN/We Shall Never Die                02:45















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© 2009 Danny Meltzer.

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Thank you for listening!