The Man Who Seduced the World with Whale Songs

It’s been more than 50 years since biologist Roger Payne brought whale song into the lives of millions via the popular album, Songs of the Humpback Whale. At the time, commercial whaling had decimated global whale populations, and Payne’s record helped spark the anti-whaling movement, the haunting songs of the humpbacks its unofficial anthem. In the late 1960s, Payne was a senior scientist at the Institute for Research in Animal Behavior, studying animal echolocation. His chance encounter with whale song and the stunning subsequent success of the album led him to found the nonprofit Ocean Alliance in 1970, an organization devoted to scientific research and preservation of life in the world’s oceans.

Payne is now 86 years old, but no less invested in the plight of whales and other denizens of the seas. He recently spoke at a meeting of the Interspecies Internet, where Ocean Alliance was awarded a $50,000 prize to digitize the hundreds of hours of whale songs that Payne, his students, and colleagues have collected over the years.

I recently met up with Payne at his home near Woodstock, Vermont, to chat about his remarkable career, the state of the environment, and his current project to