A “Crackling, Haunting Voice from the Deep”: The Moment the World Realised Whales Sing
For centuries, whales were often seen as mysterious creatures of the ocean, feared by some and hunted by others. But in the 1950s, a series of underwater recordings began to change the way people understood these enormous animals.

In 1952, US sonar engineer Frank Watlington was stationed near Bermuda during the Cold War. He was using an early hydrophone to listen for submarines and seismic activity when he began hearing strange, mournful sounds coming from the deep ocean.

The sounds sometimes continued for hours. Watlington suspected that they were produced by humpback whales, and later evidence confirmed that he was right.

A Discovery Beneath the Ocean
Watlington shared his recordings with researchers. In 1967, he met marine biologists Roger and Katy Payne, who listened to the recordings aboard Watlington’s research vessel.

Roger Payne was astonished by what he heard. The sounds were highly varied and repeated in patterns that could continue for long periods. Researchers began to understand that these were not simply random noises — humpback whales were producing organised sequences of sounds that could be described as songs.

This discovery represented a major change in the way scientists viewed whale behaviour. People already knew that whales could make sounds, but recognising those sounds as complex songs was a much bigger conceptual step.

The Album That Changed Everything
In 1970, Roger Payne, Katy Payne and Frank Watlington released “Songs of the Humpback Whale”, an album containing recordings of humpback whales.

The album became a major cultural phenomenon. It sold more than 125,000 copies, making it the best-selling nature album in history at the time. An excerpt was also distributed to more than 10 million National Geographic subscribers, exposing millions of people to the mysterious sounds of whales.

The recordings also became closely associated with the emerging Save the Whales movement. Instead of seeing whales only as enormous animals that could be hunted for resources, people could now hear them in their own homes.

The haunting sounds helped create a new emotional connection between people and whales.

From Whale Songs to Conservation
The popularity of whale song came at a time when humpback whales were under severe pressure from commercial whaling. By the early 1970s, fewer than 5% of their estimated pre-whaling population remained, according to the BBC report.

The whale recordings became part of a wider environmental movement. In the United States, the Marine Mammal Protection Act was passed in 1972, while an international moratorium on commercial whaling was adopted in 1982 and took effect in the following years.

Humpback whale populations have since recovered significantly in many areas, although whales continue to face threats including ship strikes, fishing-net entanglement, underwater noise and climate change.

Why Do Whales Sing?
Scientists still do not have a complete answer.

Humpback whale songs are mainly produced by males. Researchers have suggested that the songs may play a role in mating, competition, communication or other social behaviours.

Scientists have also discovered that whale songs can change over time and spread between different populations. This has led researchers to describe whale song as a form of animal culture that can move through ocean populations.

Other whale species have also revealed fascinating communication systems. Sperm whales, for example, use sequences of clicks called codas, while blue whales produce extremely low-frequency calls capable of travelling vast distances underwater.

A Voice We Are Still Learning to Understand
More than 70 years after Watlington first recorded those mysterious sounds, scientists continue to study whale communication.

Thousands of recordings now exist, preserving the voices of individual whales and providing researchers with a way to study how whale communication changes over time.

Yet the ocean itself has also changed. Human activities have created increasing levels of underwater noise, making it more difficult for whales to communicate.

The discovery of whale song therefore represents more than a scientific breakthrough. It changed the way millions of people thought about one of Earth’s largest animals.

What began as mysterious sounds detected by a Cold War sonar engineer eventually became a worldwide symbol of wildlife conservation — a haunting voice from the deep that taught humanity to listen.

Sources
BBC Future — A “crackling, haunting voice from the deep”: The moment the world realised whales sing
Ocean Alliance — Research and archives on whale communication and the work of Roger and Katy Payne.
National Geographic — Historical coverage of whale songs and marine conservation.