The Listening Project

“The Listening Project” is an ongoing community storytelling initiative working with young people and their families to share their personal connections to music and listening through audio storytelling workshops. Past collaborators have included Emily Conolan and Van Diemen’s Band. Participants are led through basic audio storytelling techniques, listening prompts, and guided to use simple recording technology with accessible devices such as smartphones. The project is always community-led in outcome, and aims to build lasting capacity in the communities.

Outcomes have included audio collages, the creation and recording of an original audiobook, a geolocated sound walk of community memories, and a guided sound walk of recorded sounds, poetry, and memories of young children as they follow a community boardwalk.

What Participants Learned

In their own words:

"We took the time to stop and listen. There are heaps of cool sounds around that you might never stop to listen to."

"We learned how to make a sound collage and how to overlap different sounds."

"We learned something new. We learned lots of new things about listening."

Workshop participants, Dorset Community House, July 2023