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Birdsong in music. The cuckoo 's well-known call is used in music by Beethoven, Delius, Handel, Respighi, Rimsky-Korsakov, Saint-Saëns, and Vivaldi. Engraving by John Gerrard Keulemans, 1873. Birdsong has played a role in Western classical music since at least the 14th century, when composers such as Jean Vaillant quoted birdsong in some of ...
- Delius: On Hearing the First Cuckoo in Spring. The English composer Frederick Delius wrote this piece when he was living in France, but it’s actually based on a folk song from Norway.
- Daquin: "Le Coucou," from Pièces de Clavecin. Louis Daquin was a keyboard soloist who dazzled the aristocracy, including Louis XIV, in 18th-century France.
- Handel: Organ Concerto in F major, “The Cuckoo and the Nightingale" After the cuckoo, the next most popular bird portrayed in music might be the nightingale.
- Beethoven: Symphony No. 6 in F major, Op. 68, II, "Scene by the brook" Beethoven’s Symphony No. 6, which he called the “Pastoral,” is an homage to the great outdoors.
- Clément Janequin: Le Chant des Oiseaux. Composers have been interpreting birdsong for as long as they have been writing music, and back in the Renaissance era, French composer Janequin celebrated the songs of the blackbird, nightingale and cuckoo in his piece, ‘Le Chant des Oiseaux’ (‘Birdsong’). ‘
- Antonio Vivaldi: The Four Seasons. The first concerto in Vivaldi’s enduringly popular Four Seasons violin concertos, Spring, opens with a bright and beautiful cacophony of bird song.
- Ludwig van Beethoven: Symphony No. 6 ‘Pastoral’ In his countryside-inspired Sixth Symphony, Beethoven transcribes accurately the cries of the nightingale, quail and cuckoo in a striking woodwind cadenza, in the second movement of the piece.
- Frederick Delius: On Hearing the First Cuckoo in Spring. The cuckoo in Delius’ 1912 orchestral piece is performed by the clarinet like Beethoven’s bird.
Apr 18, 2018 · The cuckoo’s call also finds its way into the music of Gustav Mahler. It’s a prominent voice in the first movement of the First Symphony, music which evokes the awakening hum of nature. But the cuckoo of Mahler’s First is an odd bird. Its song outlines the interval of a falling fourth rather than a third. (You’ll hear it around the 2:09 ...
- Vaughan Williams: The Lark Ascending (1914) A silvery solo violin line flutters and darts, reaching up ever higher above the orchestra’s hushed, held chord.
- Respighi: The Birds (Gli uccelli) (1928) A real-life nightingale, well, a recording of it at least, appears in Respighi‘s 1924 Pines of Rome. And the song of the nightingale also puts in an appearance in his neo-classical suite, The Birds, in which birdsong meets Baroque, as written for a 20th-century orchestra.
- Rautavaara: Cantus Arcticus (1972) Why imitate birds in music when you can use the real thing? Rautavaara’s ‘concerto for birds and orchestra’, as it’s subtitled, uses taped birdsong throughout, taking Respighi’s idea one step further.
- Jonathan Harvey: Bird Concerto with Pianosong (2003) ‘Indigo bunting, orchard oriole, golden crowned sparrow – these are some of the 40 colourful Californian birds whose songs and cries sparked the ignition of this work as I started it in the brilliant light of California,’ explained the British composer Jonathan Harvey.
But perhaps the quintessential use of the cuckoo's unique song figures in the First Symphony of Gustav Mahler. In the opening movement, a two-note motif is unmistakably the call of a cuckoo. This is BirdNote! Bird song is heard frequently in the music of the masters. And no bird has been so often evoked and emulated in song and symphony as the ...
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May 7, 2019 · But she’s also a musician, the 2009 International Bird Call Imitation Champion, and hosts her own bird call YouTube series, ” Caterwauling with Kristen.” This story is best experienced by listening, but here are some interview highlights: On why she thinks composers are drawn to the cuckoo (and why they aren’t as charming as we think):
