(for my father)

When I was young, I remember my father telling me about a film which consisted of a sports car driving at incredibly high speeds through Paris at dawn, from the Boulevard Périphérique all the way to the Baslique Sacré-Cœur in around 9 minutes. The film was shot from the front of the car and the soundtrack was the sound of the car's engine. The film was C'était un Rendez-vous shot by Claude Lelouch in 1976.

Much as I enjoyed the soundtrack, I would watch (as a tourist) all these famous Parisian landmarks flying past and wonder about the real soundscape of these places. One Sunday in June 2006 I walked the route which Lelouch's car takes, recording sounds in various places along the way - some are general soundscapes which reflect the different acoustic properties of the spaces, some are particular sounds (cars running over drain covers, ambulance, street musicians).

I took various 'restrictions' from Lelouch's film: