Crickets in the Concert Hall:A History of Animals in Western Music

Abstract

Animal song appears in human from a wide variety of time periods and cultures, but the way it is used varies enormously. In cultures where people interact intensively with the natural world, is often used to communicate with non-human animals, whether for practical, spiritual, playful or other purposes. Music often serves to bridge the gap between humans and non-humans. In urban cultures, including those which nurtured the development of Western classical music, animal songs are more often used either symbolically or as sources of raw sound material to be transformed into music by the human composer. Communication with animals is seldom the goal, and animals are kept strictly as other. However, recent discoveries of shared attributes between humans and other species (sign) language use in chimpanzees and self-awareness in dolphins, for example have been accompanied by a new willingness on the part of composers to accord animal songs intrinsic value. A number of recent composers have written pieces in which animal songs are given equal footing with their own music. Yet direct interaction with animals remains rare in the modern urban context: we are now willing to recognize the aesthetic work of animal songs, but not to engage in musical exchange with the animals themselves.

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