Knock Knock: 200 Years of Sound Effects

Crash! bang! wallop! Composer Sarah Angliss celebrates the power of sound effects.

It’s 200 years since Thomas De Quincey wrote On the Knocking at the Gate in Macbeth, the first serious consideration of the strange and powerful psychological impact of sound effects - sounds which aren’t language or music but still carry a level of meaning which seem to elevate them above our everyday sound world.

To mark the occasion, composer Sarah Angliss meets some of the world’s foremost sound designers to consider the enduring power and ubiquity of the sound effect.

She's accompanied by musician and esoteric researcher Daniel R Wilson and renowned foley artist Ruth Sullivan. In rural Sussex, Sarah tracks down musique concrète experimenter and Pink Floyd collaborator Ron Geesin to hear what happens when sound effects take centre stage. From his studio in California, Star Wars sfx legend Ben Burtt shows Sarah how to make the real sounds of places which have never existed. And in Bristol, natural history sound editor Kate Hopkins reveals the secrets of bringing silent footage of jungles, oceans and savannahs to life.

200 years after De Quincey’s essay, sound effects are refusing to stay on the stage and screen. Philosopher Ophelia Deroy describes the very real impact of sound effects in our everyday lives - from product design to the basics of how perceive the world around us.

Whether we notice them or not, sound effects have created the modern world - so listen up and hear what it’s made of.

Thomas De Quincey .... Anton Lesser

Writer: Ed Baxter
Presenter: Sarah Angliss

Mixed by: Mike Woolley
Producer: Michael Umney
Executive Producer: Lance Dann

A Resonance production for BBC Radio 4, first broadcast in February 2023.