Sound. It can make your world lovely or drive you crazy. As a drummer Julian Treasure, author of book Sound Business and chairman of UK-based consultancy Sound Agency, started listening to sound more carefully. What he heard really got on his nerves. It was a world of unnecessary and stressful noise.

In addition to his music Julian now beats a drum for sensible and beautiful sound - or what he calls soundscapes - which he believes have an enormous impact on or health and sanity. These are natural generative sounds which stimulate our brains and increase productivity.
 
There is no point in just playing music over noisy traffic or a humming fridge. Julian calls this 'icing on mud'. Instead he argues that we need to think about the design of places around us, learn to create environments that soak up sound and also allow ourselves just a bit of silence every day. Listen to the report to hear the results of Julian's work.
 
This story was taken from the latest edition of Earth Beat - Sensing our environment.