Revitalising soundscape of 'holy cross' sacred grove - baradi, goa: acoustic environment's affective and metaphysical heritage

Abstract

Pilgrims throng to the sacred grove of Holy Cross Baradi to be revitalised by the 'metaphysical' experience of this hill-top space. This study soundscapes 'Holy Cross' sacred grove as a 'Revitalising space' extrapolating and complementing ISO/TS 12913-1/2/3 methods to connect the auditory, affective and meta-physical perceptions of the acoustic (natural/human/machine/live-performance) environment. 'Background noise levels' (LA90) ranged between 36dB-43dB. Amongst significant results, 'natural' sounds were found more loud, clear, tonal, intimate, pleasant and eventful and evoked better 'heightened awareness', as compared with other 'incidental' sounds and were perceived as more intimate, less loud, less pleasant, less eventful as compared with 'live performance'; Amongst significant relationships for 'natural sounds' perceptions: acoustical 'heightened awareness' and 'harmony' multiregressed with subjective impressions of loudness, clarity, tonality and intimacy; acoustical 'eventfulness' was predictable from 'clarity' and 'tonality'. Amongst significant relationships for 'live performance' perceptions: acoustical 'pleasantness', 'eventfulness' and 'inspiration' multiregressed with subjective impressions of loudness, clarity, tonality and intimacy; 'heightened awareness' was predictable from 'loudness'; 'stillness' was predictable from loudness, tonality and intimacy respectively; 'harmony' was predictable from loudness, clarity and intimacy respectively. The 'context' was perceived as optimally 'revitalising' (mean=4.71 on a scale of '+1 to '+5').