Bird songs, poems, music
 

Bird songs have played a role in a few poems on the Met board recently, including my "Aubade." In that discussion, one member posted what I found to be a worthwhile link:
http://songbirdscience.com/resources...tlab-functions

Today an article from The Guardian came to my attention, about the importance of bird songs to the history of music. This is not a new discovery, but it is timely for certain reasons:
https://www.theguardian.com/music/mu...vital-to-music

Some of us may find bird songs more of a delight and comfort than we realize.

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They sell clocks where each hour is marked by a different bird's song. I was going to get one for a blind student of mine, so that she could enjoy knowing twelve local birds by their song when she heard them. I never did, which i somewhat regret.

John

Today, fortuitously, began here in the UK with an all-night programme celebrating the dawn chorus. There was poetry and music galore; it might have been made for Claudia. Let me see if I can link to it...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b08pdfyw

My roommate has an old record from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology that I love to listen to. It's supposed to accompany the Peterson Field Guide to Birds of North America, but we don't have that book, so there is something anti-anti-mimetic about hearing a narrator tell me the name of the bird, the page on which it appears, and then a recording of the bird to match its illustration in a book that does not exist for me.

John, I think my neighbor has one of those clocks. It alarmed me once when I was visiting, but the calls seemed realistic. Back when I used to visit Missouri, I found plush toy birds at Bass Pro containing real birdsong recordings that play when you squeeze the toy. My grandkids still love them.

Ann, that's amazing! Thank you for posting the link. The program certainly is long enough to last all night, so I just skipped around and listened to parts of it. The bird songs and choruses are beautiful, but I kind of wish the guys would be quiet more of the time.
Does the BBC broadcast something like this periodically, or was this one unique?

Orwn, that's hilarious. I hope at least 50% of that record consists of bird calls.

Thanks, all.

Claudia

What a well-written, fascinating, and even-poetic piece. Claudia, thanks so much for posting this! They are one of my greatest pleasures in life, the birds are.

I had one of those clocks, too, which Mr. Isbell mentions. As I recall, I got it as a "thank-you" gift for my contribution to a Bird Sanctuary Conservancy group.

I smiled, at the mention of "domestic cats," among the threats to their existence :o

Jennifer

Claudia -

I should have added to this thread before, but I was hesitant since I don't have much to say apart from I'm glad you liked the link I gave you to the studies on birdsong, and that I'm glad you decided to make a thread on this topic.

I'll be the first to acknowledge science as the leading force in the overall march of human progress. I don't think anyone would seriously contend that. Religion, the arts, and philosophy - they have their impact, but scientific research and its continuous, growing, and exhaustive work has undoubtedly been the greatest boon to mankind.

That being said, I think we're still worlds away from truly understanding the so-called "lower animals". Who knows what wonders of communication, story-telling, even poetry, may be present in whale-songs, bird-songs, etc?

And YAY! that Jennifer has added her thoughts.

First, I am as sure as I am about anything that we humans give non-human animal intelligence only the slightest amount of credit. What we don’t know dwarfs what we do know. It’s human nature that we don’t see what is right in front of us happening all the time. Science will vindicate.

I have a love-hate relationship with birdsong. For me, it’s best enjoyed as a kind of easy-listening music. But when I focus too closely on it, their songs can become torturous repetition and I begin to feel like I'm being nagged by a three-year-old who keeps asking the same question over and over again -- Or I begin to guess what the real meaning is behind the “singing”. That it’s just a frilly way of saying things like “I’m horny” and “Where is everybody?” and “Get out of my tree! That’s my tree!”.
On the other hand, I was in Costa Rica recently and was floored by the symphonic cacophony of birdsong everywhere I went (we stayed in a nature reserve in a treehouse in the rainforest. I was so taken with the sound I placed my phone outside for an hour and recorded it. I still listen to it from time to time).

But really, of all (non-human) languages, birdsong might be the sweetest.

On this general topic, does anyone recall the call by Troubadour for an anthology devoted to poems about or influenced by music? And did anyone who submitted hear from them? I submitted and didn't hear from them.

Incidentally, for those of you going to MLA 2018, a friend of mine (Gerard Holmes) is presenting a paper on Emily Dickinson and birdsong. Knowing Gerard, it should be a worthwhile panel.