Hey, I'm Flora Lichten, and you're listening to Science Friday.

That sound of a choir performing in a cathedral is iconic for a reason. It's a beautiful human experience being side by side with other people,

feeling the sound vibrate through you, reverberating around the space. But how long has that

been a part of human culture? And when we look back at ancient humans during the ice and Stone Age times, what role did sound play in their lives?

That's the focus of a growing field of archaeology called archaeoacoustics, where researchers use the scientific tools of today to investigate the role of sound and music in the past.

Joining us now to talk about it are my guests, Dr. Margarita Diaz-Andro, professor at the University of Barcelona, Spain, and principal investigator of the Art Soundscapes Project, and Dr. Rupert Till, professor of music and head of the Department of Humanities at the University of Huddersfield in the UK.

I want to welcome you both to Science Friday.

Hi.

Hello.

Marga, you're an archaeologist.

You study rock art.

How does sound come into it?

Yes, I am an archaeologist, and archaeologists usually don't deal with sound.

I came to it through an interest in the material.

I had been studied color in the landscape and the location of sites.

I had also been looking at other issues that usually archaeologists don't pay much attention to.

Like what? Give me an example.

Like things that are disregarded. Archaeologists usually look at typologies, the form of objects

and chronology, and I wanted to go a bit beyond that.

Sort of more the human aspect of archaeology and the emotional aspect of archaeology.

There are other archaeologists who are dealing with issues with taste and also touch.

But in my case, I started with color and then I moved into sound.

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