A little over a century ago, a woman named Beatrice
Harrison played cello in her garden in Oxted, Surrey. Beatrice had recently
performed the British debut of Delius's Cello Concerto, which had been written
for her. When weather permitted, Beatrice enjoyed practicing in the garden. The
birds in the woods surrounding her house apparently enjoyed the music. Some of
those birds were nightingales. Nightingales are famous for their ability to
imitate the songs of other birds, even matching the pitch and duration of
notes. Beatrice noticed the birds were copying some of the passages she played;
a sort of bird-and-cello version of dueling banjos. After repeating this
performance several nights in a row, Beatrice persuaded the BBC to record and
broadcast the phenomenon. May 19, 1924 radio listeners heard a cello-nightingale
duet for the first time. Audiences were so enthralled, they demanded an encore
every spring for twelve years.
No comments:
Post a Comment