The challenges of recording the sounds of horses

As a sound designer, sound engineer and sound effects publisher, I spend a lot of time working with audio recording equipment, trying to capture sounds that people will want to use in their media productions, and thus, want to buy from our library.

There are sounds that are easy to capture (i.e. pouring water into a glass – usually the first sound recorded by anybody who ever got a microphone). ? And then there are sounds that are notoriously difficult to capture, and chief among them: Animal sounds. Animals really are a sound professional’s worst nightmare, because they are totally unpredictable, won’t stand still, won’t make a sound when you want them to, and generally make life hell for a hopeful sound recordist.

Even among animals, there are those that are (relatively) easy to work with, and those that are more difficult. Generally speaking, horses are difficult because their entire existence is based on moving around. They are quite literally made to move, to run away from danger. So as you can imagine, standing still with a professional sound recorder and microphone (perhaps multiple microphones), all rigged up with cables and headphones – trying to get good horse sounds is a thankless task! Not only are the horses perpetually restless and want to keep moving around all the time; they are also curious. Show them a piece of sound recording equipment or an odd looking microphone with a wind muffler on, and they will simply stand there and observe, not uttering as much as a peep. They’ll watch, consider, and perhaps silently chew a couple of times. Much to the audio professional’s frustration!

Anyway, in the horse wav sounds section of our site, you can hear what we’ve managed so far. Many of the sounds you’ll hear there were recorded by me personally. There are some horse trotting and galloping sounds, horse shoes clattering on the floor and on hard shingle, some horse neighs and snorting. My wife and I both use this rather cool horse whinny sound as a text message alert sound on our cell phones. This particular sound was recorded in the summer of 2008 with a Zoom H4 portable sound recorder and the actual horse is called Queen of the Moor. She’s the one pictured with me, above.

I’ve also recorded some longer sounds, of horse racing stadiums. This sound and this sound were both recorded at the Meadowlands horse racing track in New Jersey, in 2007, during the annual Hambletonian race for 3 year old trotters and pacers.

I hope you’ll enjoy and find some use of our horse sound library. Thanks for reading!

As a sound designer, sound engineer and sound effects publisher, I spend a lot of time working with audio recording equipment, trying to capture sounds that people will want to use in their media productions, and thus, want to buy from our library.

There are sounds that are easy to capture (i.e. pouring water into a glass – usually the first sound recorded by anybody who ever got a microphone)? And then there are sounds that are notoriously difficult to capture, and chief among them: Animal sounds. Animals really are a sound professional’s worst nightmare, because they are totally unpredictable, won’t stand still, won’t make a sound when you want them to, and generally make life hell for a hopeful sound recordist.

Even among animals, there are those that are (relatively) easy to work with, and those that are more difficult. Generally speaking, horses are difficult because their entire existence is based on moving around. They are quite literally made to move, to run away from danger. So as you can imagine, standing still with a professional sound recorder and microphone (perhaps multiple microphones), all rigged up with cables and headphones – trying to get good horse sounds is a thankless task! Not only are the horses perpetually restless and want to keep moving around all the time; they are also curious. Show them a piece of sound recording equipment or an odd looking microphone with a wind muffler on, and they will simply stand there and observe, not uttering as much as a peep. They’ll watch, consider, and perhaps silently chew a couple of times. Much to the audio professional’s frustration!

Anyway, in the horse wav sounds section of our site, you can hear what we’ve managed so far. Many of the sounds you’ll hear there were recorded by me personally. There are some horse trotting and galloping sounds, horse shoes clattering on the floor and on hard shingle, some horse neighs and snorting. My wife and I both use this rather cool horse whinny sound as a text message alert sound on our cell phones. That particular sound was recorded in the summer of 2008 with a Zoom H4 portable sound recorder and the actual horse is called Queen of the Moor. She’s the one pictured with me, above.

I’ve also recorded some longer sounds, of horse racing stadiums. This sound and this sound were both recorded at the Meadowlands horse racing track in New Jersey, in 2007, during the annual Hambletonian race for 3 year old trotters and pacers.

I hope you’ll enjoy and find some use of our horse sound library. Thanks for reading!