Although urban historians have recently begun to study the city and the senses, relatively few have investigated the aural environment experienced by the ear. To a certain extent, towns are thus characterized as silent societies and sounds of whatever kind are not viewed as an integral part of urban life. This article, based on a small Spanish town called Jaca, aims to describe some of its most notable sounds during the ancien régime and to explore how inhabitants perceived them. Such an approach provides a deeper and more comprehensive insight into the totality of the urban experience of townspeople of the period, and also suggests some new lines of enquiry for future musicological research.