Artist, musician and creative arts therapist Katie Down is preserving a piece of Marlborough’s collective memory, one conversation at a time.

Through Sound Stories, a community oral history project funded by a New York State Rural and Traditional Arts Fellowship grant, Down is documenting the voices, memories and experiences of residents of the hamlets of Marlborough and Milton.

The project will culminate Oct. 16-18 with immersive audio walking tours and a community celebration. The complete oral histories will be preserved for future generations at the Marlboro Free Library.

Down began conducting interviews this spring and has recorded about 35 residents, with a goal of reaching 50 to 60 participants.

Rather than simply documenting historical facts, Down said the project is intended to give residents an opportunity to reflect on what home, memory and community mean to them.

“The project that I proposed is an oral histories project,” Down said. “Being a sound artist and somebody who’s interested in story, I thought this would be a perfect project to highlight the community in which I’m living, get to know people, give people a platform to express themselves, think creatively and connect.”

Each interview includes about 20 open-ended questions designed to encourage participants to share their experiences. Residents are also asked to identify a song and a sound that have personal meaning to them. Those selections will become part of Down’s artistic compositions.

Listening as compassion
Down said the most surprising part of the project has not been the stories themselves, but the generosity and vulnerability residents have shown in sharing them.

“I think the most surprising aspect of listening to everyone’s stories is my own emotional feelings around the intimacy and vulnerability that comes through with everyone’s willingness and openness to be vulnerable and generous with their time,” she said. “I find it very moving.”

That approach reflects Down’s background as both a therapist and artist.

“I’ve spent much of my professional life as a therapist and Deep Listener,” she said. “I’ve studied Deep Listening practice with Pauline Oliveros, and that practice is an integral part of who I am as a composer, sound artist and therapist.”

Down said she approaches each interview with curiosity and without judgment.

“I value everyone’s presence on this earth equally and enter into a conversation with curiosity and a non-judgmental approach,” she said. “Listening is probably the first act of compassion, and I am in constant practice of it.”

An artwork built from voices

While the complete interviews will be archived at the Marlboro Free Library, Down will use excerpts from the recordings to create immersive sound collages.

The project’s second phase involves listening to nearly 100 hours of recordings, selecting excerpts and combining them with ambient sounds gathered throughout Marlborough — from local businesses and natural spaces to the everyday sounds that help define the community.

The resulting compositions will form two audio walking tours: one through the hamlet of Marlborough and another along the Marlboro Nature Trail.

Down hopes participants will be able to use a geolocation app that plays different recordings as they move through the community, allowing voices and sounds to emerge in the places they reference.

She intentionally designed two routes to accommodate residents with varying levels of mobility.

Rather than presenting complete interviews, the walks will function as an audio collage.

“It’s sort of an abstract recording that gives an essence of the community,” Down said. “It’s more like looking at a painting or a collage in its entirety.”

Discovering home
Down has lived in Marlborough since 2016, but she said the interviews have changed the way she understands the community she calls home.

“Interviewing people has given me a broader and at the same time deeper appreciation of Marlborough and the place I call home through each of the stories shared, sounds gathered, the town celebrations, music, art, food and the beauty of our natural surroundings,” she said.

“I have learned much more than I thought I would in just the two months of interviewing people, and I can say that without exception, everyone has been incredibly kind, generous of their time and energy, and welcoming.”

The project also has sparked a greater interest in Marlborough’s history.

“For me, this project has given me a glimpse, a deeper curiosity and desire to know the history of our town and the two hamlets of Marlboro and Milton that comprise greater Marlborough,” Down said.

She compares a community to the rings of a tree or the petals of a flower, with each layer contributing to the whole.

“Communities are living organisms that grow and change,” Down said. “Like the peels of an onion, the petals of a rose or the rings of a tree, it’s in the layers and details of the parts that make the whole.”

A project meant to continue
Down hopes Sound Stories will continue beyond the October events and become a lasting community resource.

As part of the grant, four digital audio recorders will remain at the Marlboro Free Library. Residents will be able to borrow the equipment to record and preserve their own family histories. Down also plans to offer free workshops on conducting oral history interviews.

She hopes to continue interviewing residents after the grant concludes and expand the project with additional public walking tours in the spring.

“My gift to the community,” Down said, “is to provide an opportunity to learn about each other, our loved ones, our community and our ancestry.”

The project will culminate with four guided walking tours Oct. 16-18, followed by a community gathering at The Falcon featuring storytelling, poetry, music, conversation and an open microphone. The gathering will give residents another opportunity to share their own stories and experiences.