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A sonic trip through our on-hold, tick-box, automated world, which turns bureaucracy into art and music.

With audio collaged from public transport announcements, customer service phone lines, chat bots and computer error codes, this is an aural journey through the multitude of depersonalised and depersonalising messages that accost us every day. Hearing from members of the public across Britain who vent their tales of admin woe, this programme gives voice to the frustration we all feel.

We also hear the ‘content creators’ put their side of the story – from on-hold messaging designer Nikki Cooper to Emma Clarke, the voice of Mind the Gap. Cultural analysts Peter Fleming and Jamie Woodcock throw light on the causes of contemporary digital bureaucracy, and Helen Dewdney suggests ways to flex our consumer rights.

Finally, with the help of composer Neil Luck, we transform these grey snowdrifts into an original musical composition that sublimates dross into art. Through auditory alchemy, the negativity we are all subject to is transmuted into something of value that lifts us out of the everyday, reclaiming the human from digitised modern life.

Producers: Eliane Glaser and Jon Holmes
Composer: Neil Luck
Performers: Patricia Auchterlonie (soprano), Tom Jackson (saxophone), Rebecca Burden (cello)
Sound Design: Tony Churnside and Jon Holmes.
Readings: Hazel Holder

Noise is an unusual production for Â鶹ԼÅÄ Radio 3