When you hear a Veery Thrush’s complicated mixture of sound, Charlie “Bird” Parker might not be the first comparison you consider—unless you’re David Rothenberg and have dedicated much of your life to the magic of interspecies communication and can hear in a bird’s trill a sophisticated jazz riff.
Professor of philosophy and music at New Jersey Institute of Technology, Rothenberg delighted his audience Thursday night at the Gibson Fine Arts Center at Washington College with stories about his interest in communicating with other species, from birds to bugs, and whales.
The lecture/performance was hosted by WC’s Sandbox Initiative and Music Department.
Using audio tapes and videos of his musical explorations with birds and whales—yes, even cicadas—for his “Improvisation With Nature” lecture, Rothenberg displayed his experiments with sound connectivity between species by playing clarinet and saxophone riffs.
Fascinating sonic graphs of bird songs and whale sounds were also presented to point out the highly structured composition of animal sounds.
Communication between species has long been studied. From Francine Patterson’s work with Koko the gorilla, who knows 2,000 human words and 1,000 American Sign language gestures, to Denise Herzing’s exciting work with two-way acoustical interfaces with dolphins, the interest and research into interspecies connectivity has gained wider interest with both scientists and artists.
Rothenberg has been in the forefront of environmental philosophy and the exploration of the relationship between human and natural history. He’s the author of two dozen books—some as co-author—and recorded more than nine CDs, along with performing with many musicians, including Peter Gabriel.
For an interesting read about how art and science can sometimes collide, a conversation between Rothenberg and a New Zealand engineer at Wood’s Hole Oceanographic Institution may be found here.
Rothenberg writes, “There is music in nature and nature in music. What may be most wonderful is that we can love and be immersed by both without needing to understand how the two are forever intertwined. It is enough to know that they are,” says Rothenberg in “A Sense of Soundscape.”
Here, the musician plays a duet with thrush and a whale.
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