#wildlife #nature #Birds #Music
Birds Were the First Musicians
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A bold statement I know, but bare with me. I recently read a book called 'Was Beethoven a Bird Watcher?' - to answer your question, I like to think he was, but he didn't need to be. More on this later!
This book, written by David Turner, dives into the history of birds and how they are intertwined with our development as a society. In his essay about the Cetti's warbler (pronounced 'Chetty's'), David made the following comment:
"...the world's first music was made not by humans but by birds...[1]"
This goes deeper than it might initially seem. Music is an art which transcends time, communicates emotion in a way in which words cannot, and connects people across all cultures and beliefs. Music is an art form that is undeniably human; But is it? One source suggests that the first music was made as far back as 43,000 years ago based on the the discovery of small, primitive, flutes made from ivory and bone. If we assume they were used to make music, then we know humans have been creating pleasing tunes for a very long time.
What about the birds? The numbers vary on when the songbird emerged, but it's on the order of 30 MILLION years ago. There is a good chance there was a bird 'singing' well before the ivory flutes were played. Maybe music isn't a human creation after all.
I think it's fascinating how nature can cause us to question aspects of life that we usually don't even give a second thought to. I want to dive into the nature-first idea for music. To do so, we need to first define what music is.
The Dipper has a beautiful song, not often heard above the sound of a babbling brook.
What is Music?
Everyone will come up with a broadly similar answer to this one. Of course, music is when we make pleasing sounds! Thats not a bad definition, but I went looking and found something more specific:
"vocal, instrumental, or mechanical sounds having rhythm, melody, or harmony"
Ok, so thats how Merriam-Webster define music. Let's breakdown the parts so we know what each one is, then we can apply it to bird song and see how we get on. We should then be able to say for sure whether we can consider bird song, music.
Vocal, instrumental, or mechanical sounds
This one is easy, if the sounds comes from vocal chords, instruments or otherwise another mechanical source. I would add that digital a source is also worth mentioning, but I guess the digital sound requires something mechanical to 'make' the sounds i.e. a speaker.
Birds use vocal chords to make their sounds so it's check mark for this one! ✅
Rhythm
Rhythm is the arrangement of beats and sounds at intervals, usually with periodical stress. For example (hum without changing pitch!):
da-da-da-daaaaa-da-da-da-daaaaa
Do birds have a rhythm when they sing? Absolutely! ✅
Melody
Melody requires rhythm but adds to it changes in pitch or notes. So the rhythm is the timing and length of notes, the melody is the actual combination of notes played and how they are arranged horizontally. For example (you can hum with pitch changes):
di-di-di-duuuur-di-di-di-duuuuur
What about melody? I'd say so! ✅
Harmony
Harmony considers how notes are arranged vertically. Essentially, this is when more than one note is played at the same time and how those two sounds complement each other. Think about how in choirs multiple notes are sung at the same time and it sounds perfect. Contrast this to what it might sound like if you or I tried to join in.
Finally, do bird songs show signs of harmony? Yes, they do! ✅
Below is a screenshot of a spectrogram in the Merlin bird ID app. Notice the defined frequencies that the Eurasian blackbird sings simultaneously? Harmony.
Blackbird song spectrogram from Merlin (ebird)
So, do birds make music?
If we look at it on a strictly technical basis, yes, birds do make music. They also learn from each other, develop their songs over generations and produce tunes to be heard. This sounds a lot like what musicians do. I appreciate music can mean very different things to very different people and cultures, however considering the technicalities of what music is, and if we adopt a non-anthropocentric world view, we can scrutinise this argument further.
Again, I really like the idea that nature came first on this one. In a world where we are forever adopting an anthropocentric approach to explaining what we see around us, it's important to remember we are but a speck of dust on the history of life on Earth.
Conclusion
There is a well known method for proving arguments called Syllogism. We can state two premises. If we agree they are true, then the conclusion must be true. Lets apply it to this argument:
- Premise 1: Music is a collection of vocal, instrumental, or mechanical sounds having rhythm, melody, or harmony.
- Premise 2: Birds can produce vocal, instrumental, or mechanical sounds having rhythm, melody, or harmony.
- Conclusion: Birds make music.
Ok, so I'm going to side with David on this one, birds really do make music, and the did so way before humans. Yes, birds cannot write it down and record their music, but they make the music nonetheless.
So, if music was created before humans were alive, it stands to reason that humans might have been inspired by the bird song around them, whether they knew it or not. I wonder if we can attribute any other classical art forms to nature?
A Final Note: Beethoven and Birdwatching
I think it's worth covering off a little bit of what David raises in his book. Was Beethoven a Birdwatcher? Well, we know Beethoven loved to be outdoors. Whether he was an actual birdwatcher, who knows?
When he stayed in the country with his brother, Beethoven would go out for daily walks, so frequently that locals became used to seeing him pacing around, shouting and waving his arms in the air. Some locals even reported seeing Beethoven...
"...suddenly, in full stride, he would slow down, then stop, take out his notebook and scribble something down." - John Suchet[2]
We then know that while he was out and about, he was probably inspired by his surroundings whether he knew it or not, and this likely made it into his music. This doesn't mean he was a birdwatcher, but birds surely inspired him. If he was a true birdwatcher, with a Bonn life list, then Beethoven would have been one of the earliest birdwatchers. The title of first birdwatcher goes to Gilbert White (born in 1720). Beethoven and Gilbert co-existed for nearly 24 years!
Are there an examples of Beethoven being inspired by bird song? David presents, in my opinion, a crystal clear example. In Movement IV of his 2nd Symphony, the first several notes sound uncannily like the song of the Cetti's warbler.
So there you have it, birds invented music and Beethoven probably plagiarised the Cetti's warbler
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Created by Niall Bell (niall@niallbell.com)