Sam Lee

This is work of firstly of gratitude, of thanks for such an important character who's been part of our ancient kinship with the natural world.

We'll be joining folk singer and nature activist Sam Lee.

A night ago could be very useful for young lovers.

They sing at 90 decibels, so they're so prolifically loud that they would cover up the squeals of delight of young lovers.

Good evening, everybody.

Hello, hello.

Welcome to Sing with Nightingales and to the Log Cabin, our guest musician for tonight, who I'm so happy has come over from, well, from New York via Canada, via New York, via like Newfoundland, Newfoundland, with her banjo and her amazing accompanist, Ben.

This is Kaya Keita, our artist for tonight.

Twelve years ago, I came here to do a little Radio 4 documentary honouring the 90th anniversary of Beatrice Harrison in 1924 and the BBC doing a duet with the Nightingale.

And in honouring of that historic moment, I brought my musicians from my band and we started playing with the Nightingale in the dark, a little bit like the way she had played.

But I wasn't prepared for the response, the way the Nightingale started to sing in accordance within key, in this kind of co-responsive, playful way.

And I knew instantly this was an extraordinary phenomenon.

I needed to bring people to come and experience this.

My passion for nature and my passion for music suddenly came into beautiful synergy.

So for 11 years since, I've been welcoming participants into these woods here in Barkham in Sussex.

And we do a whole immersion of leading people not just into the dark to hear the nightingale, but into reality.

what it's like to be in the realm of the nightingale, the mythic, poetic role this bird has played in our and many other cultures throughout time.

It is quite out of this world and I think the experience for the participants is quite a threshold one.

It's about stepping into the unknown, walking in the darkness without light, sitting in close proximity to a wild and possibly soon to be extinct in this country rare species that has a song that just rinses through you.

And it brings up such an amazing range of emotions and reflections and possibilities, ways of feeling things that we don't often have the space or afford ourselves the space to really tune into.