One of the most stunning field recordings of the past decade is Starry Night by Mazen Kerbaj.1 Mazen is Lebanese and lives in Beirut. He describes the recording as, ‘a minimalistic improvisation by: mazen kerbaj/trumpet, the israeli air force/bombs’. It documents the sounds on the balcony of his flat on the night of 15/16th of July 2006 during Israel’s summer war against Hezbollah in Lebanon. The recording starts with small breathy sounds made on the trumpet. They are quiet, but seem very close. One listens attentively. Suddenly an explosion shatters the stillness. The sound instantly lights up the city as it reverberates off buildings and hillsides briefly revealing the panorama, as would a lightening flash. Simultaneously the blast triggers car alarms and sets dogs barking pin-pointing their positions near and far before they fade to a tense quiet waiting for the next bomb to fall. It is one of those rare recordings where sound exhibits the same power of illumination as light. Throughout, Mazen continues to play minimal trumpet, quietly creative against the violence. His recording not only documents the events taking place, but is an act of imaginative defiance in its own right. For a listener the impact is powerful. The perspective reveals the city’s geography, a major aspect of its current political context and a very personal response to the situation. It is the dramatic conjunction of these elements within a single recording that makes it so memorable. 

https://blogs.mediapart.fr/david-oppetit/blog/090417/field-recording-sonic-journalism