The Byward Market is Ottawa at its most urban extreme. It is in the heart of the city. It is trendy. It is never quiet. It is the place where people meet for all kinds of reasons - to buy fruit, flowers and vegetables. To meet friends in a bar or street-side patio. To "be seen", cruising the streets in hot cars on hot summer nights.

It is also a place where street people feel a connection to the mainstream of life, plugging them into the currents of humanity which pass them by. They are not alone here. The darker side lives here too - a place where problems can be danced and drank away, anesthetized by booze, drugs and unceasing noise.

Ottawa's reputation is that of a sedate, polite and elegant city. Many people spend large amounts of time polishing its sharp edges. Byward Market is both a polished and a sharp edge at the same time. It is a place where people play out the human drama in all its forms. Playing out the rhythms of daily life, it is a place to watch humanity in all its incarnations pass by.

It is a place where the daily script of the human story is written, in all its simplicity and complexity, paradox and contradictions. The soundscape of this part of Ottawa is equally complex, with sounds of the harsh and beautiful colliding in mid-air.

Soundwalks of the Market

May 25, 2000
July 19, 2000
September 4, 2000
September 22, 2000

Sounds of the Market

Vegetable Vendors [Listen]
Street Preacher with flute [Listen]
Sounds of ever-present traffic [Listen]
Folk Rock Buskers [Listen]