Saturday Drama: Under Milk Wood in Surround Sound

Editor's note: BBC Radio 4 offers you a special chance to hear the highly-acclaimed 2003 production of Under Milk Wood, celebrating the centenary of the birth of Dylan Thomas in surround sound (Saturday 18 October at 2.30pm). Starring Richard Burton it features an all-Welsh cast, including early appearances by Ruth Jones and Matthew Rhys, and a cameo role from John Humphrys.

The 2003 production was streamed online in 5.1 surround sound and now that 5.1 mix will also be available on-line in an experimental player on the Radio 4 website. Here Rupert Brun, Head of BBC Technology explains how to get enjoy the Surround Sound experience of this very special broadcast.

What’s happening?

This version of Under Milk Wood was recorded in surround sound and when first broadcast in 2003 it was available in this format to listeners at home who had the right equipment and software. When the play is repeated on Saturday 18 October at 2.30pm the surround sound version will be available as a live stream; the play will also be available “on demand” from about 5pm that day for the next 30 days. If you don’t have a surround sound system you can try our experimental “binaural" experience, which turns the surround sound stream into an immersive headphone listening experience.

How to Listen to Under Milk Wood in Surround Sound

If you have surround sound speakers

You will need a computer with a broadband internet connection, an HTML5 compatible browser (such as the latest version of Chrome) and sound card connected to your computer with at least six channels, which should in turn be connected to a “5.1” surround sound system.

If you have headphones

You will need a computer with a broadband internet connection, an HTML5 compatible browser (such as the latest version of Chrome), a sound card with a stereo headphone output and a pair of headphones.

Where to find the audio

You will find the player for both loudspeaker and binaural headphone version on this web page

You will also find a link to some “Frequently Asked Questions” which include a test player so you can check your loudspeaker system is working before the play starts. If you are using the binaural experience you shouldn’t need to check it in advance, you can switch to different versions of binaural sound during the play.

What new technology is being used?

You don’t have to understand any of this in order to enjoy the surround sound experience; it’s included for those who want to know a bit about the underlying technology.

There is a new standard for HTML, the language that operates the World Wide Web, called HTML5. It includes an Audio API (application programming interface) which for the first time allows a web browser to play surround sound without the need to download and install additional software. It also includes the Mediasource API, which enables us to use MPEG-DASH, a new standard for media delivery, to get the data to you. Not all web browsers fully support HTML5 (particularly the Mediasource API) yet; we have tested the experiment using Chrome under Windows 7 and Mac OSX, and Internet Explorer 11 under Windows 8.1, but it might work with other combinations of computer and browser. We made all of the BBC Proms 2014 available using this technology.

The web browser also has the capability to render the 5.1 surround sound stream into a binaural presentation for headphones. This can provide a headphone listening experience which sounds as if it coming from outside your head, with front to back localisation of sound. To make binaural sound work perfectly we would really like the web browser to render the sound in a way that is optimised for the shape and size of each listener’s head but this is not practical at present so we are offering a choice of three different versions for you to try. We have not previously tried a public experiment with a surround sound stream rendered into binaural sound in a web browser so we are really keen to know what you think of it. To find out more about binaural sound and how this experiment works you can visit the BBC R&D Blog.

How can we give feedback?

You can comment on this blog or on Twitter using the hashtag #BBCR4UMW.

What if it doesn’t work?

As this is very experimental I’m afraid we can’t give you individual help getting it working but check the FAQ to make sure the equipment and web browser you are using are compatible with the experiment. If you can’t make it work or just don’t like it please let us know; you can listen to the broadcast in stereo on the radio, TV or online as usual.

Rupert Brun

Rupert Brun is Head of Technology for BBC Radio

BBC R&D blog: Find out more about Under Milk Wood in surround sound