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 ..read more

To the average driver seeing it from their commute, The Kentucky Derby Festival Great Balloon Race might seems like a peaceful, placid affair. But as anyone who's ever been to the Balloon Glow or the liftoff of the Great Balloon Race knows, it takes a lot of generator-powered fans and roaring gas jets to get the colorful balloons off the ground. To hear the full recording, explore the sound map, or submit a sound visit www.wfpl.org/sounds or www.kentuckianasounds.org ..read more

The sounds of a college football game can travel pretty far. So can the sounds of a freight train. Drawn to the periphery of Cardinal Stadium by the Clemson at UofL game in 2015, Kentuckiana Sounds curator Aaron Rosenblum found that the adjacent railroad tracks were as noisy as the game itself. To hear the full recording, explore the sound map, or submit a sound visit www.wfpl.org/sounds or www.kentuckianasounds.org ..read more

Recording studio co-owner Jeff Dickerhoof set out to record the wind chimes on his back deck only to have the wind turn to rain and thunder, and a chance to record the storm instead. To hear the full recording, explore the sound map, or submit a sound visit www.wfpl.org/sounds or www.kentuckianasounds.org ..read more

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 ..read more

While walking down 6th St., Kentuckiana Sounds curator Aaron Rosenblum found himself enveloped in a droning, omnipresent hum reverberating among the buildings on the block. Was it coming from an HVAC system? Or from the service vehicles parked nearby with giant tubes protruding from their trailers? Or from somewhere else entirely? To hear the full recording, explore the sound map, or submit a sound visit www.wfpl.org/sounds or www.kentuckianasounds.org ..read more

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 ..read more

Musician and student Chris Leidner lives in a noisy neighborhood. His Old Louisville apartment is above a narrow street where the sounds of cars and motorcycles ricochet and rattle his windows. Airplanes fly low on their approach to Muhammad Ali International Airport. And yet he makes space for the small sounds of home, like this radiator that offers a surprising variety of sounds for those willing to listen. To hear the full recording, explore the sound map, or submit a sound visit www.wfpl.org/sounds or www.kentuckianasounds.org ..read more

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 ..read more

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 ..read more