Four Peaks Sound Walk

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Sound Walk: Four Peaks Sound Walk: Ben Nevis

Ben Nevis

BBC Radio 3 - Sound Walk, Four Peaks Sound Walk, Ben Nevis

Horatio Clare climbs Ben Nevis in the first of his four Sound Walks across the UK.

Horatio Clare climbs Ben Nevis in the first of four Sound Walks up the four great peaks of the United Kingdom.

Glen Nevis is the starting point as Horatio Clare walks towards the huge rampart of Ben Nevis, on this, the first of four Sound Walks up the four great peaks of the United Kingdom. 

With surrounding mountains like sleepers tangled in their bedding of mist, it’s a sweet and gentle start to the climb of Scotland and Britain’s highest mountain. Hunched and cragged with round heavy shoulders it’s approached on the bridle path – the route used by thousands of hikers every year. 

On the climb we discover the origins of the mountain’s name, the geology which spans vast periods of deep time, as well as meeting some of the characters of the mountain. Horatio recounts stories of adventurers, ice climbers, mountaineers, poets and scientists. 

And the mountain changes its mood – the wind becomes colder with seas of mist. There are scenes that could be straight from Game of Thrones or Lord of the Rings; screes of rocks with paths climbing into opalescence and nothingness; half imagined walkers striding through a frontier of obscurity; the earth emerges smoking and steaming from the magma below. 

Walking alongside parties of climbers, all doing it for their own reasons, this journey is part of a grand tradition of scaling the mountain. Horatio asks why so many of us flock to the high places. This journey is a pilgrimage – in hope and faith, a walk for so many through difficulty, and for which so many are rewarded. 

The first of four programmes for Christmas 2021 in which Horatio Clare travels to the four highest peaks of the four UK nations. Climbing Ben Nevis in Scotland, Slieve Donard in Northern Ireland, Scafell Pike in England and Snowdon in Wales, he sets out on an epic journey up the monolithic titans to take the temperature of this particular moment in time and our relationship with the outdoors. 

Approaching the dozing giants, not in an athletic spirit of conquest but in a spirit investigation and curiosity, he arrives at the foot of each of them with no preconceptions, but with an open mind in the hope of climbing to the attic of each country and looking through the skylight to see how they talk to each other and how they talk to us. 

Hearing the birds, smelling the fresh air, being shrouded by mist and cloud whilst also soaking up the light, shades and colours, with long periods of carefully recorded atmosphere, interwoven with music and lucid descriptions, this is radio that’s designed to take time to hear. 

Music threaded through the programmes include works from a wide variety of genres by composers and performers including Amiina, Olafur Arnalds, JS Bach, Beoga, Gavin Bryars, Anna Clyne, Laurence Crane, Danish String Quartet, Dalla, Alex Groves, Leos Janacek, John Luther Adams, EJ Moeran, Úna Monaghan, Anne Müller,  Nordic Fiddler’s Bloc, Vikingur Olafsson, Morfydd Owen, Puuluup, Penguin Café, Aidan O’Rourke, Richard Strauss, Ralph Vaughan Williams, A Winged Victory for the Sullen and many more. 


Books and sources used for research include: 

Ben Nevis: Britain's Highest Mountain - Ken Crockett and Simon Richardson

Twenty Years on Ben Nevis - William T Kilgour

The English Lakes: A History - Ian Thompson

Below Scafell - Dudley Hoys

The Pinnacle Club for Women Climbers pinnacleclub.co.uk/journals

On Cambrian and Cumbrian Hills - Henry S Salt

Slieve Donard's Domain - Nicholas Russell

Snowdon: The Story of a Welsh Mountain - Jim Perrin

Portrait of Snowdonia - Cledwyn Hughes 

Mountains and Desire - Margaret Grebowicz

Sound Walk: Four Peaks Sound Walk

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Horatio Clare travels to the four UK nations to climb each of their highest peaks.

Horatio Clare travels to the highest peaks of the four UK nations, climbing Ben Nevis in Scotland, Slieve Donard in Northern Ireland, Scafell Pike in England and Snowdon in Wales.

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