Station 5 of 13 · Perception · sound, opt-in

The journey soundscape

Thirteen stations, thirteen quiet voices: the one you stand at ahead of you, the one before to your left, the one after to your right. Off until you turn it on.

Opt-in · off by default · nothing plays by itself A quiet soundscape that follows the Journey of a Drop: the station you are on sounds ahead of you, the one before to your left, the one after to your right. It starts only when you press “Journey sound”, and every sound has a caption.

The sound needs JavaScript, which is off or has not loaded. The whole score is written out below, station by station.

The score, and its transcript

Each station has one voice in the leitmotif’s materials: a copper-bowl tone (a pair of sine tones about 0.9 Hz apart, so it beats gently, with partials at 2.7 and 5.4 times the note) and, on the stations of the top notes, glass. The pitch follows the drop: low at the origin, rising to the top notes, settling through the heart, falling to the dry-down. The notes come from one pentatonic scale, so neighbours sound together.

The journey soundscape, station by station: the note, what you hear, and what sounds round you when you stand there. Taste values, decided by the house; an evocation, not a claim about how smells sound.
StationNoteWhat you hearBrightnessStanding here, you hear
1 · OriginG2 · 98.00 Hza low bowl tone, earthylowpass 1200 HzStation 1 · Origin ahead: a low bowl tone, earthy (G2); Station 2 · Material to your right: a bowl tone, a step up (B2)
2 · MaterialB2 · 123.47 Hza bowl tone, a step uplowpass 1850 HzStation 1 · Origin to your left: a low bowl tone, earthy (G2); Station 2 · Material ahead: a bowl tone, a step up (B2); Station 3 · Extraction to your right: a bowl tone with a rising breath, like steam (D3)
3 · ExtractionD3 · 146.83 Hza bowl tone with a rising breath, like steamlowpass 2446 HzStation 2 · Material to your left: a bowl tone, a step up (B2); Station 3 · Extraction ahead: a bowl tone with a rising breath, like steam (D3); Station 4 · Molecule to your right: a bright tone with glass (G3)
4 · MoleculeG3 · 196.00 Hza bright tone with glasslowpass 3700 HzStation 3 · Extraction to your left: a bowl tone with a rising breath, like steam (D3); Station 4 · Molecule ahead: a bright tone with glass (G3); Station 5 · Perception to your right: the brightest tone, glass ticking (B3)
5 · PerceptionB3 · 246.94 Hzthe brightest tone, glass tickinglowpass 5000 HzStation 4 · Molecule to your left: a bright tone with glass (G3); Station 5 · Perception ahead: the brightest tone, glass ticking (B3); Station 6 · Skin to your right: a warm bowl tone (A3)
6 · SkinA3 · 220.00 Hza warm bowl tonelowpass 4313 HzStation 5 · Perception to your left: the brightest tone, glass ticking (B3); Station 6 · Skin ahead: a warm bowl tone (A3); Station 7 · Memory to your right: a slow, wavering tone (E3)
7 · MemoryE3 · 164.81 Hza slow, wavering tonelowpass 2905 HzStation 6 · Skin to your left: a warm bowl tone (A3); Station 7 · Memory ahead: a slow, wavering tone (E3); Station 8 · Accord to your right: two tones a fifth apart, held together (D3)
8 · AccordD3 · 146.83 Hztwo tones a fifth apart, held togetherlowpass 2446 HzStation 7 · Memory to your left: a slow, wavering tone (E3); Station 8 · Accord ahead: two tones a fifth apart, held together (D3); Station 9 · Perfumer to your right: a rounder bowl tone (B2)
9 · PerfumerB2 · 123.47 Hza rounder bowl tonelowpass 1850 HzStation 8 · Accord to your left: two tones a fifth apart, held together (D3); Station 9 · Perfumer ahead: a rounder bowl tone (B2); Station 10 · Bottle to your right: a glass tone, like a flacon tapped (G3)
10 · BottleG3 · 196.00 Hza glass tone, like a flacon tappedlowpass 3700 HzStation 9 · Perfumer to your left: a rounder bowl tone (B2); Station 10 · Bottle ahead: a glass tone, like a flacon tapped (G3); Station 11 · In your room to your right: a soft tone close by (E3)
11 · In your roomE3 · 164.81 Hza soft tone close bylowpass 2905 HzStation 10 · Bottle to your left: a glass tone, like a flacon tapped (G3); Station 11 · In your room ahead: a soft tone close by (E3); Station 12 · History to your right: a low tone, slower (A2)
12 · HistoryA2 · 110.00 Hza low tone, slowerlowpass 1506 HzStation 11 · In your room to your left: a soft tone close by (E3); Station 12 · History ahead: a low tone, slower (A2); Station 13 · Atelier to your right: the low bowl tone again, darker (G2)
13 · AtelierG2 · 98.00 Hzthe low bowl tone again, darkerlowpass 1200 HzStation 12 · History to your left: a low tone, slower (A2); Station 13 · Atelier ahead: the low bowl tone again, darker (G2)

How it behaves

  • Off by default. Nothing plays until you press “Journey sound”; the browser’s audio is created inside that press. Press again and it fades out; the audio clock then stops. Leaving the page, or hiding the tab, stops it too.
  • Spatial. The station ahead sounds at full level; its neighbours at about a third, at 60° to the left and right (with your browser’s head-related panning where it has one, otherwise a plain stereo pan). Moving to another station glides the voices round you; if your device asks for reduced motion, the change is a plain cross-fade instead.
  • On every lab page. The same switch sits under the station strip of the lab pages and follows that page’s station.
  • Quiet and captioned. It sits well below the site’s leitmotif (a limiter keeps the peaks down); each change writes its caption under the switch, as in the table above.
  • Private. Nothing is stored, nothing is sent; there is no recording, only synthesis in your browser.
  • An evocation. Pairing a pitch with a station is the house’s choice. It takes its cue from studies of crossmodal matching (Crisinel and Spence, 2012: how pleasant and how complex an odour seemed, not how strong, predicted the pitch people matched to it), and it claims nothing about smell.

The Sensory Calibration Lab · The Scent Translator · The GC-MS, heard · Read the essay on perception

version 1 · updated 2026-09-30