Music and language bear meaning through sound in time. What more magnificent an example as that of birdsong, which predates both these forms of aural (human) communication, the larger branch from which the distinctions 'music' and 'language' were made, to inform both. It is neither music nor language, and it is both. Avian folksong and bird-language taken as a whole exhibits an abundant variety and richness of sonic palette comparable to our own folk-musics and world-languages. Birds without a song of some kind are as much an exception as human cultures without a musical heritage.
Birds, seen in this way, are reared as model musicians, from the inchoate sounds of their beginning calls begging for food slowly learning, practicing and refining (by ear) the phrasing and nuance, until exacting the nuances of the acoustic signature to which they aspire as would an engaging public speaker or virtuoso instrumentalist., some with the ability to interact with and replicate the sounds they hear rivaling the best jazz improvisers---singing like their lives depended on it, because if you are a bird, it does.
These acoustic 'links' between apparently distinct concepts go to suggest others: In this work, the links between avian and instrumental sound-production are explored, employing various strategies in how the translation is both represented and performed in an attempt to approach these strange, this-worldly melodies and sonic vocabularies as closely as possible with the violin despite vastly different sound-producing mechanisms. Sound-sources consisting of a few short samples representing various sounds of each bird attempted were located, analyzed and meticulously transcribed into music notation, some employing electronics in addition, and each structured and composition reflecting something of the subject-bird's language, resulting in an improvisational 'map'. The musical territories and conceptual compositional structures discovered in the process, as well as some instrumental solutions arrived at out of necessity, are novel, complex and suggest musical ideas yet to be realized, while the results themselves are remarkably familiar. ~David Adamczyk
'Flying Mobiles' was written as the sound installation for the 'Bird Captures' exhibit at BT&C Gallery in Buffalo, NY January 3rd to 29th in collaboration with local artist, designer and photographer Julian Montague.
credits
released February 20, 2015
tracks 1, 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12, 14, 16, 18, 20-23 composed, performed, recorded and edited by David Adamczyk
tracks 3, 5, 7, 9, 11, 13, 15, 17, 19 from the Macaulay Library, edited by David Adamczyk
cover art by Julian Montague
license
Some rights reserved. Please refer to individual track pages for license info.
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