I just came back from walking my two dogs along a dusty road in the campo. We were out about an hour. When we left it was daylight and when we were done it was dark and the path was illuminated chiefly from light reflected from clouds which were, in turn, reflecting the streetlights of Villafranco del Guadalhorce and, more distantly by the city lights of Málaga and Alhaurín de la Torre.

The last stretch of our track encircles a large field and the track, relative to the field, is elevated. Normally the field is bare. They grew grass there in the spring, harvested hay later, and now it is mainly the stubble. But tonight the field was a concert hall and the the musicians, though barely perceptible in the gathering darkness, were all dressed in white. They were sheep.

It would be stretching things to say that the shepherd was a conductor, but he was at least overseeing his orchestra of musical ruminants. Those sheep, as you probably know, wear bells and the notes each plays is distinctive. I would imagine that the shepherd is well able to identify the individuals by the tone of their bell. As a result of the movement of the sheep there is unique sound that, in the darkness more than the light, created a beautiful aural landscape to compensate for the visual landscape that has been lost with the sunset.

Anyway, I walked along the track and listened to the tinkling bells and it occurred to me that the song that was played by these animals, without their knowledge or understanding, was quite unique in the history of the universe and would never, nor could never, happen again. The shepherd, our dogs and the sheep themselves were the only listeners and most would have paid no attention whatsoever.

I fumbled around on my phone to see if I could record it. Without glasses I never really know what I´m doing but, when I arrived home, I discovered that I had succeeded in capturing for a few seconds. If you could listen you would hear, in addition to the sounds of the bells, the voice voice of the shepherd, the movement of some dogs, and my sandals crunching along the track.

Unfortunately this format of my recording is not compatible with this blog and so I was unable to load it for you to listen to. Maybe I will be able to crack this problem later but it is getting late now and time for bed. So I would just ask you, if you have the inclination, to simply imagine a few seconds worth of sheep music under the stars of a night in Andalucía.