Composition Notebook: “Morning Birds” – the story

Last week, I wrote about forty-five seconds of new music for my composition lesson, and it was painful to do that much. This week, I’ve composed about four-to-five minutes of new music, and I don’t plan on stopping any time soon. So, what happened?

Inspiration Strikes

Many times in my younger years, I would wake up early in the morning and listen to the birds outside my window as they all sang together in a disjointed yet perfectly united choir. At the time, I did not think much of this phenomenon; it just happened. But recently, I began to think about how incredible it is that a half-dozen birds can all sit around and make some of the most beautiful music on Earth without so much as ruffling a feather. I have been interested for some time in writing music that allows for the players to have a great deal of freedom in what they play. One morning last week, as I woke up to the sound of birds singing outside, the idea hit me: I should write a piece that mimics this near-daily event of the birds waking the world up in the morning. Thus was born the concept for my latest project: ‘Morning Birds’.

What is it?

‘Morning Birds’ is a piece for small string ensemble, timpani, suspended cymbal, and (at least) four flutes. While the rest of the group provides a lush, almost audibly green background, the flutes reference a page of transcribed ‘bird calls’ which they may play from at random and too their own desire. The speed, volume, exact rhythm, and articulation which they play these bird calls with is almost completely up to them, with only basic guidelines indicated on the music page. The conductor’s score indicates specific moments in the piece where the different bird call parts enter and exit the music. The overall effect is a peaceful morning-like texture, which is brought to life by the vibrant bird sounds.

How’s it going?

Well, I began working on the project right away and immediately had some ideas for what I wanted the string section to be playing through the piece. After a few minutes sitting at my electric keyboard, I was throwing down notes on my manuscript paper. Obviously, the main challenge is creating and notating a variety of bird calls for the flute players to choose from. I thought about going the common route of recording some bird sounds in nature and then trying to transcribe them, but then I drifted towards the idea of creating a set of original sort of generic bird sounds which would simple evoke a general sense of “morning birds”.