You can stand in front of a cliff a hundred times and hear nothing special, then show up at sunrise and get a clean, low note that feels almost tuned. There isn’t one famous “singing cliff” that does this everywhere. Reports like this pop up in different places with different rock shapes and local weather. People describe it at coastal bluffs along the Pacific in California, at wind-exposed sea cliffs in the UK, and on rugged sea stacks in Iceland. The basic mechanism is not the rock “making sound” by itself. It’s air and water moving in a very specific way through cracks, ledges, and cavities, with sunrise nudging temperature, wind, and humidity into just the right range.
Why the note can be so clear and so low
A cliff can act like an instrument when it has a cavity that behaves like a resonator. A deep notch, a hollow behind a thin rock wall, or even a long crevice can set a preferred frequency. The sound stays “low” when the resonant space is effectively large, or when the opening is narrow enough to make the air mass in the “neck” oscillate slowly. That’s the same basic physics behind a bottle tone, but scaled up and shaped by erosion.
The “clear” part usually means the resonator is being driven steadily. Random gusts make a messy roar. A smooth, sustained airflow can lock onto the resonant frequency and keep reinforcing it. When that happens, other frequencies die out faster than the main one, so it can feel like a single note instead of general wind noise.
Why sunrise matters more than you’d think
Right around sunrise, the boundary layer near the ground often changes quickly. Overnight cooling can leave denser air settled in low spots, while higher air moves differently. As the sun appears, the surface starts to warm unevenly. That can shift wind direction by a few degrees or change the speed at cliff height without feeling like “windier” where you’re standing. For a resonator, a small change in how air hits the opening is the difference between silence and a stable tone.
There’s also the speed of sound. It depends on air temperature. As the air warms after dawn, the resonant frequency can drift slightly. That drift can line up with the cliff’s geometry at one particular moment, then move off it. The timing varies by season, cloud cover, and terrain, which is why people often disagree about whether it’s exactly “at sunrise” or just “early morning.”
Wind, waves, and the shape that drives the tone
On sea cliffs, waves add a second driver. A surge pushing into a sea cave compresses air, then releases it, like a slow piston. If the cave connects to an opening that behaves like a mouthpiece, each wave can give the air column a repeatable shove. When wave sets become more regular—something that can happen around certain tides—the pulses become more consistent, and the resonance becomes easier to hear as a note instead of intermittent thumps.
Even inland, wind can do the same job if the opening is shaped right. A slot that creates a stable vortex street can “feed” the resonance. A rounded lip can whistle. A jagged lip might not. This is why two nearby cliffs can behave differently, and why a minor rockfall can “break” the effect. The geometry does not need to be dramatic. A hidden cavity behind a thin face can matter more than the obvious arch you can see.
The detail people usually overlook: the air in the crack
People focus on the cliff face, but the air inside the cavity is the working part. Humidity and temperature gradients can create layers, especially overnight. At dawn, those layers can mix or slide. That changes damping. Damp, heavy air can absorb high frequencies more readily, making the low component stand out. A listener may interpret that as the cliff “choosing” a low note, when the higher, hissier parts are simply getting eaten by the air.
Another easy-to-miss factor is where you stand. A low frequency has a long wavelength. A few steps can move you from a spot where the pressure peaks to a spot where it cancels. Someone near the base might hear a clean drone, while someone higher up hears only wind. That mismatch is one reason these stories sound inconsistent when people compare notes.
Why it can vanish for months and then return
These tones are picky. A resonator needs the right driver, and the driver depends on conditions that are not stable. Seasonal wind patterns shift. Vegetation grows into openings. Salt spray can leave crusts that narrow gaps. Water can pool inside a cavity after rain and change the effective volume. Even small changes can detune the system enough that the resonance never quite “catches,” so you hear only ordinary surf or ordinary gusts.
Then, on a particular morning, everything lines up again: wind angle, steady speed, a dry opening, a wave set that pulses evenly, and air that has just started to warm. The note appears, plain and low, and it can feel oddly deliberate because it holds steady for a while before the cliff goes quiet again.
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