6 May, 2010
Bidwell Park power lines
Photo Courtesy of t_camuti ©2006
The sound you are about to hear is one that fascinated me the first time I took a walk in Bidwell Park. In January I recorded it, reported to be the third largest urban park in the US, Bidwell Park is located within the city limits of Chico, CA near “Lake” Oroville and the Oroville Dam whose power travels along said lines. The crackling that is heard is an effect called corona discharge [Wikipedia] and is caused by the interaction of power and humidity or other particles in the air surrounding the lines (as I understand it).
As you can hear the city of Chico is on the right side of the image, it is somewhat heavily rolled off to provide a more pleasant listening experience.
MS, Schoeps MK21, SD 744t 
Psych Maven said,
January 11, 2012 @ 10:03 am
Wow, this sounds like music to me.
gweddig said,
January 13, 2012 @ 9:02 am
Thanks Psych Maven!
gregweddig.net » Covid-19 Social Distancing said,
March 24, 2020 @ 1:15 pm
[…] recorded in the same place about 10 years ago as outlined here. That was stereo, this is a quad with a sub-cardioid (MKH 8090), into a SD MixPre10 […]