Listening to the Night:

Martina Testen & Simon Šerc – Nokturno (Pharmafabrik, 2025)

We opened this month’s edition of Escala de Grisos with “Nightfall”, taken from Nokturno, the new field recording album by Martina Testen and Simon Šerc, released on October 2 through Pharmafabrik.

Recorded over a period of ten years, Nokturno guides listeners through the secret life of the forest after sunset. Those hours when the human world fades into quietness and another, older rhythm emerges. Across eight chapters (Sunset, Twilight, Dusk, Nightfall, Midnight, After Midnight, Predawn, and Dawn) the album traces the arc of the night through its own natural narrative: the croaking of frogs, the whisper of beetles, the deep resonance of stags, the haunting cry of owls, and the distant, spectral howls of wolves.

The work extends the vision first presented in Biodukt, their earlier project that documented the forest during daylight. Biodukt captured the atmosphere of light, the pulse of wind and birdsong, and the unspoken geometry of the living world seen under the sun. It was celebrated internationally and featured in outlets like The Guardian and the BBC not only for its sonic quality but for the sensitivity with which it translated ecological presence into sound.

With Nokturno, Testen and Šerc turn that gaze inward. They exchange the brightness of day for the subtler language of the night a domain where visibility gives way to listening, and perception transforms into awareness. In doing so, they remind us that darkness is not absence but another mode of attention, a space of connection where the senses adapt and expand. The result is both intimate and vast: a 60-minute meditation on the fragile ecosystems that thrive beneath the canopy of stars.

Beyond its documentary nature, Nokturno functions as a work of devotion. It captures not just what exists but how it exists. The tension between stillness and movement, isolation and community, fear and serenity. There’s something profoundly human in its quietness, a shared instinct to observe, to coexist, and to find meaning in the hum of the invisible.

For us, field recording has always held a central place within the sound worlds explored in Escala de Grisos. From raw environmental recordings like Nokturno to works where these textures dissolve into ambient and electroacoustic forms, this practice reveals one of the deepest aspects of listening. It’s about patience, intimacy, and presence: an invitation to tune in to what usually escapes notice.

In that sense, Nokturno resonates far beyond its immediate environment. It reminds us that the act of listening, truly listening, can itself become a form of care. It’s an ecology of attention, a quiet gesture toward a world that continues to breathe, move, and sing when we are no longer watching.

Nightfall, the piece we chose for the show, marks the precise point where light disappears and perception begins to shift. It is a moment of surrender. The threshold between two worlds, and perhaps the most delicate kind of music there is: the one that only exists when everything else falls silent.