Programme Details

Chris Watson is a sound recordist with a special interest in the sounds of animals and habitats around the world. His latest commission finds him in Liverpool where he has composed soundtracks from two parallel worlds - the human city and the high rise Sefton tower blocks, and the animal world of the parkland that surrounds them. In Night Waves, Paul Allen meets Chris Watson at the Sefton Towers to share the mundane atmosphere of a winter afternoon, and consider the sounds that we so often take for granted - from the rumble of homeward bound commuter traffic to the rustle of bushes as foxes make their way across the park.

Channel 4 is to broadcast a series of films examining the use of torture in the war against terror. As the Western world responds to the frequently shadowy threats of Al-Qaeda, has it begun to condone the use of excessive violence against prisoners and civilian suspects? The first film in the Channel 4 season asks Is Torture A Good Idea, and goes on to examine Guantanamo Bay, America's Special Removal Unit, and the culture of violence in US jails. The journalist Anne McElvoy reviews the season on Night Waves.

Also on the programme, the Russian born but Ukrainian based novelist and journalist Andrey Kurkov talks about his latest novel about contract killing in Kiev and describes the life of the writer in the freshly democratic Ukraine. And Paul Allen and guests discuss the emerging cultural life of Singapore as a new festival from the region opens in Britain.

Night Waves, live at 9.30pm, here on BBC Radio 3.


Presenter: Paul Allen
Producer: Anthony Denselow



Additional Information:
1) A Matter of Life and Death by Andrey Kurkov is published by Harvill
2) Torture Season on Channel 4 begins on February 28 with Is Torture A Good Idea, and The Guantanamo Guidebook. Torture: The Dirty Business and America's Brutal Prisons are transmitted on March 1 and 2.
3) Insomnia season - Transcending Jetlag in Phnom Penh, Bangkok, Jakarta and Singapore - runs at the ICA in London until March 12.
3) A Winter's Tale by Chris Watson is a new commission recorded on location with the residents of Sefton Park tower blocks in South Liverpool.