Martyn Ware, Charles Stooke, and Gabriel Ware present a spatial audio work on water and sound

Transmission 197: Interview with Martyn Ware

Martyn Ware is a British musician, producer, and sound designer whose work spans electronic pop, immersive audio, and spatial composition. Born in Sheffield in 1956, he co-founded The Human League in 1978 and later formed British Electric Foundation (B.E.F.) and Heaven 17. Since the early 2000s, he has developed large-scale three-dimensional sound environments through Illustrious Company, a studio he launched with Vince Clarke to explore the use of ambisonic audio in public, artistic, and scientific contexts. His projects have included commissions for Tate Britain, the Science Museum, the Venice Architectural Biennale, and the Royal Ballet.

Title: It’s Always Ourselves We Find In The Sea
Artist: Martyn Ware
Genres: Ambient, Avant-garde, Experimental Music
Label: Cold Spring: Industrial, Dark Ambient & Ritual Music News
Description: Martyn Ware releases a new ambient album with Charles and Gabriel Ware via Cold Spring on 4 April 2025.

His recent collaboration with his son Gabriel Ware and sound artist Charles Stooke resulted in It’s Always Ourselves We Find In The Sea, an ambient two-part composition originally conceived as a 3D sound installation at the Saatchi Gallery. The piece was produced by Illustrious Company with contributions from Oscar Blustin and Anna Söderblom and addresses the human relationship with water through both environmental recordings and fictionalized acoustic ritual. Structured around the water cycle and mythological interpretations of aquatic forces, the work combines field recordings, spatialised sound, and immersive composition techniques. It was released by Cold Spring on 4 April 2025 and remains part of an ongoing series of environmental installations exhibited internationally.

How did the collaboration between you, Charles, and Gabriel begin for this particular installation and album?

I have a company called Illustrious Company. We’ve been doing 3D sound installations for the last 25 years. My son Gabriel has been helping me—he’s the head composer for Illustrious. We’ve been working together on various 3D sound installations for galleries and outdoor installations for ages.

I have a long-term association with Venice. I used to live there part of the year for 28 years. I had an apartment there, and I’m in love with Venice, the water, and everything around that. A few years ago, I became friends with Oscar Blustin and Anna Söderblom, who had just moved to Venice. They’re passionate about it. We got along very well, and they were working on immersive theatre projects. At the time, they were developing a show that was going to take over a huge palazzo on the Grand Canal, populating it with 30 actors, recreating the decadence of the 17th and 18th centuries in Venice.

I asked them if they had considered using immersive three-dimensional sound as part of the experience. They hadn’t, and that idea came right before lockdown. The project fell apart for obvious reasons.

But we said, let’s create a small-scale pilot project as an example of what we could do together. They said they had just the place: a friend had an old warehouse storage space in Palazzo Contarini Polignac on the Grand Canal. It’s a beautiful space, used for pop-up exhibitions. So we thought—let’s do an exhibition there. But what would we do?

We all agreed that one of the unique things about Venice is the water. So we decided to create a sonic theatrical piece based around water: its history, its importance to all life, water rituals across the world, and the cyclical journey of water—from rain through streams, rivers, to the sea, evaporation, and back to the clouds.

We wanted to create an emotional journey in immersive sound based on that cycle. Anna, who’s a writer for several major newspapers and magazines including The Guardian, wrote a kind of manifesto for the project. Over time, we developed the idea.

What we ended up with is the piece It’s Always Ourselves We Find in the Sea. When we first presented it in Venice, it was so impactful that people came every day—during their lunch breaks or after work—using it almost like therapy. They felt emotionally engaged, especially those who love the sea, as many do in Venice.

In developing the special composition, how did you approach translating the oceanic references into sonic form?

Right. Essentially, it’s impressionistic. But the core of it is narrative—what story are we trying to tell? That’s why it was useful working with Oscar, who designs dramatic experiences, and Anna, who understands the metaphorical side of exhibition work.

We started by gathering recordings of water rituals from around the world. Over three months, on and off, we researched sound recordings of rain dances and water rituals—often from remote places where rain is critical to survival. We don’t face that in Northern Europe, but many places on Earth, increasingly so, do. That formed the first section of the composition.

Then we thought it would be good to dramatize the journey of water, which we’re all part of. Wherever we live—in cities or the countryside—that water cycle is essential to life, not just human life. So we built the piece around that.

I asked Gabriel to compose something that would evoke that cycle, and he did a brilliant job. We combined his work with sound effects, immersive spatialization, and surround sound. The section at the end, where you feel alone at sea, drifting in and out of consciousness—that part is very emotional for me. I’ve often been out at sea alone, and that part resonates personally.

The creative process evolved organically over months. We set a few parameters, but let it grow, rather than forcing a fixed concept.

What roles did each of you play in constructing the two-part composition? Was the workflow sequential, layered, or simultaneous?

Gabriel received a brief from us: to evoke the journey of water from mountains, through different courses, down to the sea, and back to the clouds. He worked on that independently.

Everything was assembled in my studio. I refined the work—like cooking, really. Gabriel’s music was a key ingredient, and I added musical and electronic elements, then mixed and spatialized everything.

Composing in three dimensions is very different. It’s not just about making it sound good on speakers or headphones. It’s about creating an alternate reality in the listener’s mind.

Were any specific sound sources used to represent natural elements like evaporation, rainfall, or tidal movement?

Yes. We did field recordings—rainfall, water, streams. Some were from previous installations. Others we sourced online.

One important recording was a thunderstorm I captured in West Virginia. It was beautiful—distant thunder, getting closer, lightning strikes, rain hitting trees and leaves, then gradually fading. I’ve used it in other compositions, but it’s in this one too. So it’s a mix of live field recordings and found material.

What prompted the decision to reconfigure the sound installation into a standalone audio release?

My friends at Cold Spring, the record label, contacted me. We’d worked together before—they released Music for Stowaways, an album of mine from 1980 under the British Electric Foundation.

They had seen I’d been working on various installations. Normally I just put them online for free because they aren’t commercially viable, but I want people to hear them. Cold Spring asked if I’d be interested in a limited edition CD release.

I said yes. They do fantastic packaging and treat creative work with respect. I told them to keep the money—just send me 100 CDs to give to friends or maybe sell a few at installations. That works for me. No one’s going to make a fortune from it, but it helps support small record labels.

The album references ancient rituals and mythologies. Were there particular societies or cultural sources you focused on during the research phase?

Yes. Many Native American communities have a deep focus on rain for agriculture, and there are lots of recordings of those rituals.

We also found African rain-invoking music—songs where people play water like a percussion instrument using their hands. That’s part of the beginning of the piece.

But these are just fragments. The larger message is that we should be more respectful and not take water for granted. With climate change, we may face desertification and mass migration within 10 years. That could severely disrupt civilization.

At the Saatchi Gallery exhibition in London, we tried to make this clear with signage and reading material connected to the installation.

Beyond its gallery and audio forms, are there future plans to adapt or expand the project into other platforms or iterations?

Yes, we’re always looking for new ways to present different forms of the exhibition worldwide. If anyone listening or reading has ideas, we’re open to discussing them. Each time we’ve shown the piece, it’s been different.

The sound remains the same, but the space and visual components vary. We’re also interested in integrating live performance—perhaps dance, or musicians playing alongside the three-dimensional sound. Maybe as part of a festival.

This issue isn’t going away. It’s only becoming more relevant. We see it as a long-term project.

Are there upcoming projects where you plan to further integrate ambisonic audio with environmental or scientific themes?

Yes. Right now the exhibition is on at Peace Hall in Halifax, Yorkshire. It’ll run for another two weeks. In May, we’re showing another piece in New York at the Focus Art Fair in Chelsea.

I’ve always been interested in how sound affects the human body. I’ve dabbled with sound as medicine—it’s not a new idea. It’s kind of outsider sound art, but during our exhibitions and research, we came across frequencies that affect the body.

One is 111 Hz—a low A. It’s been scientifically shown to induce trance states. So we created a 50-minute composition based on that frequency. We encourage people to sit or lie down, immerse themselves in it, and it’s designed to induce a trance.

We call it Mesmerine 111. We even created fictional pharmaceutical-style packaging for it, as though it were a medicine. We’re calling the concept “musical pharmacology.”

It will be presented from May 14th to 17th at Chelsea Industrial. The art fair will host 80 artists across 50 rooms.

Photo courtesy of Martyn Ware

Matteo Damiani

Matteo Damiani is an Italian photographer and author. Curator of the sites Retrofuturista.com; weirditaly.com; china-underground.com and others