BirdNote; Vivaldi's Goldfinch

BirdNote®

Vivaldi’s The Goldfinch - When Birds Inspire Music

Written by Bob Sundstrom

This is BirdNote.

[Song of European Goldfinch]

Can bird song inspire great music? It certainly caught the ear of Italian composer Antonio Vivaldi, widely celebrated for his exuberant, playful melodies. Vivaldi even named a 1729 flute concerto for a bird, the goldfinch.

[Musical passage from The Goldfinch]

The flute is perhaps the instrument best suited to recreating the whistled sounds of songbirds. Vivaldi’s Goldfinch concerto, or Il Gardellino, challenges the flute to imitate the bird’s silvery trills and sweetly warbled phrases, even its plaintive notes.

[Longer musical passage from The Goldfinch]

The source of Vivaldi’s inspiration? The European Goldfinch! It’s a tiny bird found throughout much of Europe, where it frequents gardens and roadsides. [Song of European Goldfinch] And it has the looks to match its sparkling song. Its striking red-and-white face is set off by yellow and black wings.

No wonder Vivaldi found the goldfinch irresistible.

[Musical passage from The Goldfinch]

For BirdNote, I’m Mary McCann.

[Musical passage from The Goldfinch]

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Song of the European Goldfinch recorded and provided by M. Stewart, naturesound.org.

Flute Concerto Op. 10 No. 3 in D major RV428 'Il Gardellino': I. Allegro. “Vivaldi: Flute Concertos” by Richard Tognetti. EMI Classics: 2006

* Flute Concerto in D Major, "The Goldfinch/Il Gardellino " RV428

BirdNote’s theme music was composed and played by Nancy Rumbel and John Kessler.

Producer: John Kessler

Executive Producer: Chris Peterson

© 2013 Tune In to Nature.org September 2013 / 2017 / 2019 Narrator: Mary McCann

ID# vivaldi-01-2008-09-10-KPLU vivaldi-01b