RUDIGER ORTIZ-ALVAREZ: BIOLOGY & SOUNDSCAPES
Rüdiger Ortiz-Álvarez is a biologist and scientific researcher from Spain with a diverse interdisciplinary profile. During his Ph.D. tenure at the Center of Advanced Studies of Blanes, he studied the microbial biosphere of lakes in the Pyrenees Mountains. Given his musical training, he decided to also study the emergence of sounds in natural environments.
He studies the soundscapes of a unique ecosystem, the Laurisilva forest in Garajonay National Park in La Gomera, Canary Islands. This lush ecosystem harbors mature, sub-tropical communities, preserved for thousands of years thanks to a stable climate and scarce human contact. On the island, humans communicate using a whistled language.
Ortiz-Álvarez shows the link between Silbo-Gomero and the island soundscapes through a musical piece featured in a short documentary. The ultimate goal of his project is to raise empathy towards the natural world by using the intrinsic link to natural soundscapes.