Cities and Memory - remixing the world

Part of the Sacred Spaces project - find out more at http://www.citiesandmemory.com/sacredspaces

Recorded by Cities and Memory, with thanks to the Churches Conservation Trust.

The Church (no dedication), Pendock, Worcestershire.

Pendock church is seen standing proud above the motorway to Ross-on-Wye. Earthworks in fields north of the church mark the site of a medieval village and probably the de Pendocks' manor house. Much of this charming church is Norman. although the tenth-century font suggests an even earlier building; in the fourteenth century new windows were added, and the west tower was built. There are lovely sixteenth-century pews and Jacobean communion rails. It is thought that the famous English composer Sir Edward Elgar may once have played the lovely little Georgian organ inside.

Part of the Sacred Spaces project - find out more at http://www.citiesandmemory.com/sacredspaces

Recorded by Nick St. George, with thanks to the Churches Conservation Trust. Bells recorded from the belfry.

Part of the Sacred Spaces project - find out more at http://www.citiesandmemory.com/sacredspaces

Recorded by Nick St. George, with thanks to the Churches Conservation Trust.

This hillside church stands in a pretty churchyard and is a convenient stopping point for Wylye Valley walkers with wonderful views. There has been a church here since Norman times and the font in the church today dates from that period. However, the current building was built in the fourteenth century and then largely rebuilt in the medieval style in the nineteenth century, using the original materials. The outside is built in a chequerboard pattern of flint and stone, typical of many churches in this area. Inside it is light and airy. There is an elegant screen which dates only from 1912 - the architect F C Eden was commissioned to design it, as well as other woodwork in the church. He had intended the screen to be painted, but this was never carried out, mainly because the screen was tremendously unpopular with the people of the parish. One of the most touching monuments in the church is a poignant memorial to two babies of Thomas and Joan Crockford, showing one child in bed and the other wrapped in a shroud - Thomas Crockford was the vicar in the 1600s.

Part of the Sacred Spaces project - find out more at http://www.citiesandmemory.com/sacredspaces

Recorded by Cities and Memory, with thanks to the Churches Conservation Trust. All Saint's Church, Nuneham Courtenay, Oxfordshire.

This stunning church was built in the 1760s by Solicitor-General Simon Harcourt as part of the landscaped park for Nuneham Park House. Built to a classical design, with a gleaming dome and six slender columns, the church is as magnificent as its setting overlooking the Thames. Inside, All Saints is a monument to wealth and taste, with Italian fittings, magnificent memorial sculptures and busts.

Reimagined by Cities and Memory, incorporating processed sections of Bing Crosby's legendary performance of 'White Christmas'.

Piazza Unita' d'Italia in Trieste, with Christmas songs playing over the PA, crowds of Christmas shoppers and tourists, and a stage being erected in the background for New Year's Eve.

Recorded by Cities and Memory.

Part of the Sacred Spaces project - find out more at http://www.citiesandmemory.com/sacredspaces

Reimagined by Andy Billington.

"I was drawn to this recording having visited this Church as a child many years ago. I liked the fact that the field recording tells a micro journey as you listen to footsteps across the Church floor, then the playing of the organ and finally the retreat.

I thought about everything that the Church had seen. Could the architecture soak up elements from the Services and all of emotions it had seen played out over the years?

I then thought of what all of these would sound like layered over each other (like some of the video clips on You Tube of every episode of Friends played on top of each other).

The field recording was loaded into a failing Mid 90's sampler (name unknown). Random parts were then recorded and a pattern created from the parts spread across the various trigger pads and replayed.

This was then re recorded into an Teenage Engineering OP1and further slowed and pitched down. Finally it was re recorded into Logic 8 and re ordered."

Part of the Sacred Spaces project - find out more at http://www.citiesandmemory.com/sacredspaces

Recorded by Cities and Memory, with thanks to the Churches Conservation Trust.

A large organ being played by Cities and Memory in a deserted church in a remote corner of rural England, Holy Cross, Burley.

Part of the Sacred Spaces project - find out more at http://www.citiesandmemory.com/sacredspaces

Reimagined by Tom Thompson.

"I was quite taken by the beautiful and fluid chanting in this selection. I am not familiar with this spoken language so I simply interpreted the cadence and emotional impact of the vocal sounds.

I imagined what it would sound like by adding more of a drone background chant to support the delivery of the message. I also could hear harmony wanting to emerge and of course percussion would add a bit more drama and movement to the piece.

My process was to time stretch the vocal sample, add a high harmony, mix the two tracks and then reverse the sound and reverb to create the background drone effect. I used two delay effects pedals simultaneously to process the vocals into a loose drumming percussive sound on a separate track. The main vocals also had a harmony track sub-mixed in and then was included as a separate stereo track."

Eritrean religious ceremony, Chiesa San Michele, Rome. Recorded by Robert Knight. Part of the Sacred Spaces project - find out more at http://www.citiesandmemory.com/sacredspaces