Singing Sand Beaches of the UK & Ireland

I've only had the pleasure of making the sands sing on three Scottish beaches: Camas Sgiotaig of Eigg (first photo), Traign Bhàn of Islay (second photo), and Camas an Lighe near Kentra Bay (third and fourth photos). Be careful if you walk across Camas an Lighe, as you may stumble upon unexploded munitions. 

Curious about what makes the sands sing, I found sources dating from 1891 to 1973. The first was an article in an 1891 issue of Nature, written by Cecil Carus-Wilson. You can find it at this link:

https://archive.org/details/naturelond44londuoft/page/322/mode/2up

In the article, the author states that the music from sand was simply the result of the rubbing together of the surfaces of millions of perfectly clean grains of quartz, free from angularities, roughness, or adherent matter, in the form of clinging fragments investing the grains, and that these microlithic emissions of sound, though individually inaudible, might in combination produce a note sufficiently powerful to be sensible to us.

Another description of singing sands dates to 1923 and can be found on pages 261-340 of the book Tales of Travel by CN Curzon. Pages 261-324 describe sands around the world that sing due to settling and/or wind action. Pages 324 and on describe sands that sing when walked on, beginning with the famous sands of Eigg. You can find the full text at this link:

https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=njp.32101019098233&seq=322

The most informative source I came across was an article entitled Whistling Sand Beaches in the British Isles, written by K. Ridgway and JB Scotton. It appeared in Sedimentology: The Journal of the International Association of Sedimentologists, Volume 20, p.263-279 (1973).  The link to it is: 

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/229933615_Whistling_sand_beaches_in_the_British_Isles

Be aware that you have to pay to access that article. I am basically cheap, so instead of paying $15 for online access, I spent a whole dollar in bus fare and went to read a copy in the University of Washington Library. It was in a section of the library I'd not been to before, and to my surprise, I discovered a massive row of stacks filled with hundreds of journals and reports on Sedimentology—heavy reading, indeed.

The article described various experiments used to understand why the sands sing, which confirmed the theory stated in the issue of Nature quoted above. It also states that musical beaches are always near Bedload Partings (BLP) on the continental shelf. You can read about BLPs at the following link:

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/9781444304138.ch1

Also included in the 1973 article was a list of the 33 singing sand beaches in the UK and Ireland. (See the map at the end of the post). If making the sands sing intrigues, here is a list of the musical beaches in Scotland:

Rackwick Bay, Hoy: ND 2063 9844; Dunnet Head; Cruden Bay: NK 0853 3506; Montrose Bay: NO 7351 6085; Lunan Bay: NO 6923 5113; Tyninghame Beach: NT 6268 8201; Broadsea Bay: NW 9712 6010; Ardneil Bay: NS 1869 4830; Traigh Bhàn, Islay: NR 3461 4409; Ardnish: NM 7001 8065; Roshven: NM 7044 7882 or NM 7099 7920; Camas an Lighe, Ardnamurchan: NM 6128 6903; Camus Sgiotaig, Eigg: NM 4710 8996; Guinaird Bay: NG 9509 9026; Clashnessie Bay: NC 0577 3106

As mentioned above, the only beaches in the list I've had the pleasure of making sing are those of Eigg, Camus an Lighe, and Traigh Bhàn. A short recording of the Blue Danube Waltz played on the Eigg Sands can be found in this post from 2013:

https://marccalhoun.blogspot.com/2013/04/the-sands-sing.html

There is one singing beach in particular on my list to visit, and that is the one at Ardnish. The reason is because of the stunning four-volume Ardnish series written by Angus MacDonald. If you've read the books, you'll understand why I want to walk out to the old settlements around Peanmeanach. Then, after seeing the ruins, I'd detour a mile west to make the sands sing. Directions to Peanmeanach are on this Walk Highlands page, which oddly makes no mention of the singing sands: 

https://www.walkhighlands.co.uk/fortwilliam/peanmeanach.shtml.