Music for Birds

Dulcitar Music (also known as stick dulcimer & strumstick)

I find it nice to know some tunes that dwell within one octave. 

One reason is that for the majority of my tune writing and playing, I lived with a cat. His ears didn't seem to appreciate any tin whistle notes above the first octave. So out of consideration to his ears, a large amount of the tunes I wrote stayed in the first octave.

I also play musical instruments for people with developmental disabilities. If the mood is calm & quiet, and I'm maybe trying to help them relax or sleep, a tune that goes into the 2nd octave on a tin whistle or flute may be a bit too loud. So one octave tunes are nice for this as well.

One octave tunes also give me an option of what key to play the tune in to best suit a moment. For example, on a D whistle I could play it in the first octave (D) or the second octave (G). If I'm outside and it's windy, I may choose to play in G, since the second octave is a bit more wind resistant (it's tough to play whistles in windy weather). And I could choose D or G depending on the volume of the place I'm playing. It's also nice to have options of different keys to play in so you have more of a chance of playing along with other instuments.

It might also be nice to know some one octave tunes for anyone who plays an instrument that can only play 8 notes or so. For me, this would be my pendant ocarina, which I often bring along to play while out in a forest.

And lastly, I also just find that I enjoy simplistic tunes.

So here are some one octave tunes I've recorded. Most of these are original compositions, with a few traditional tunes here & there.

One Octave Tunes

Music in Appreciation of Various Forms of Water

Music for Nature

Original Folk Tunes

A tune titled in appreciation of a very neat looking and very neat sounding bird.

Instruments:
Gold Tone tenor guitar, Burke tin whistle, Mk Pro low whistle

Starlings In The Oak Tree

Instruments:
Nick Metcalf tin whistle, Kentucky mandolin, Gold Tone tenor guitar, Gold Tone tenor banjo, shruti box, tingsha bells, ankle bells, tambourine, bongos, cymbal, triangle, egg shaker

Milkweed

Instruments:
McNally Strumstick dulcitar, Burke tin whistles, Gold Tone tenor guitar, panflute, dilruba, tingsha bells

Chipping Sparrow

A tune written after encountering some ruby-crowned kinglets.

Instruments:
Dante Music telescopic tin whistle, Gold Tone tenor guitar, Doug Tipple flute

Ruby - Crowned Kinglet

Instruments:
Burke tin whistle, Meinl egg shaker, seed rattle

The Moon Above The Marsh

This composition is titled in appreciation of a series of various forms of flowing water, which I often meditate at throughout a trail near my home. There's more or less forms of flowing water to experience along the trail depending on the time of year & amounts of precipitation. 

Typically, I first encounter a muddy region; where in certain spots, when standing quietly, gurgling water can be heard flowing beneath the leaf litter & stones. Usually in spring, when saturated by melting snow, small trickling streams flow out of this muddy area and down a subtle hill into the forest below. 

The next stop along the pilgrimage of flowing water (as I eventually grew to affectionately nickname it) is another stream, with a somewhat stronger current, trickling in the form of several small waterfalls; over stones, sticks, and leaves.

A little ways beyond all this is a small brook (or maybe it's a large stream, I'm not entirely certain). The height of the body of water, as wells as the mellow flat sandy bottom creates little sounds to hear. While I find the sight of flowing water beneficial for meditation, the main meditative fuel of these pilgrimage spots is in their auditory experience. Though usually, if quiet enough, subtle trickles & gurgles can be heard. 

Shortly beyond that location is a large & energetic brook, with lots of varying tones & depths. 

And lastly, a little was further, lies a small boggy region; with lots of deep mud (which is fun to step into) & sphagnum moss. To the far corner of small bog-like zone are two small waterfall streams, which have a pleasant gentle bell-like trickle. 

I'm quite grateful to these series of flowing water locations for several very helpful meditations they've been the doorway to.

*I also thought that the title could be interpreted as a river's journey to an ocean. Where water molecules can journey together in the form of a river; with stops at varying bodies of water, until they eventually return to the mother source of all water.

Instruments:
Wildwood dulcitar, Burke tin whistle, Gold Tone tenor guitar, ghungroo bells, sleigh bells, tingsha bells, triangle, bodhran

The Pilgrimage Of Flowing Water

Instruments:
Burke tin whistle, WuYou tongue drum

Daffodils Beside The Barn (version 2)

Instruments:
dulcitar, tin whistle, tingsha bells, sleigh bells, triangle, egg shaker

Moon Glowing On The River Flowing

Instruments:
Hora octave mandolin, Burke D & low G whistles

Two Raccoons In A Blueberry Bush

Water Droplet Song

Cane Toad 2

A tune written on a tin whistle at Mud Pond Bog in Fox State Forest of Hillsborough, New Hampshire during the winter.

Instruments:
Shruti Box, Tin Whistle

Mud Pond Bog

A waltz that was written while sitting on a stone above a river, surrounded by white caterpillars.

Instruments:
High D Killarney Tin Whistle, Low D Kerry Optima Tin Whistle, Jerry Freeman Tin Whistle in the key of A

Waltz Of The White Caterpillar (version 2)

Instruments: Gardner mountain dulcimer, Kerry Optima low D whistle, Burke low G whistle, Killarney high D whistle, glockenspeil

*The photo is of striped maple bark

Striped Maple

I made my friends some homemade vegetable stock as a gift for their wedding, though i felt another gift to accompany the vegetable stock would be nice, so here's an original waltz written for my friends to accompany their vegetable stock. 

Instruments: Killarney D tin whistle, Kentucky mandolin, Jerry Freeman low A tin whistle, ankle bells, tingsha bells

Vegetable Stock Waltz

A tune written while playing a tin whistle as I was wading down a river. Every now and then I'd catch up to a duck, eventually getting fairly close as I continued to wade and whistle, then once I was quite near it, the duck would fly further down the river. This pattern continued for a little while and it seemed I was accidentally slowly chasing the duck. Which is where the name arose from. 

Instruments:
Kentucky mandolin, Killarney D tin whistle

Accidentally Following A Duck Down A River

Instruments:
Doug Tipple flute, Moroccan clay drums, sleigh bells, karatala, guiro, tongue drum

Four Pheasants

An old time folk tune.

Instruments:
Hugh Tracy kalimba, Doug Tipple low D flute, frame drum, Moroccan clay drums, egg shaker, glockenspiel

Ducks On The Millpond

An original tune that came about while playing a tin whistle and watching the sun shining on an icy pine tree.

Hilary Dirlam:
melodica

Zach Schneider:
tenor guitar, Killarney D tin whistle, karatala, ghungroo bells, frame drum

Sunshine On An Icy Pine (with Hilary Dirlam)

An original tune, titled in appreciation of one of my favorite fungi to encounter and eat. 

Instruments:
McNally strumstick, Doug Tipple low D flute, Moroccan clay drums, frame drum, egg shaker, tingsha bells

Black Trumpets

Instruments:
Burke low G whistle, tenor guitar, organ

White Goat

Dan Jones: acoustic guitar
Rob Newton: Snapple cap
Zach Schneider: McNally strumstick, Killarney whistle, frame drum, tingsha bells, tambourine

Rob for the Win

An original whistle waltz, written on a day that I saw a lot of Eastern Pheobes.

Instruments:
Burke tin whistle, Gold Tone tenor guitar

Eastern Pheobe

One track from my duo with Baron Collins-Hill.

www.velocipedemusic.com

Velocipede - Quail is a Pretty Bird

Instruments:
McNally strumstick, Burke tin whistles, sleigh bells, karatala

Yellow - Rumped Warbler

Written after visiting a beautiful spot called Farrar Marsh.

Instruments:
Gold Tone tenor guitar, Doug Tipple flute, karatala

Farrar Marsh

Instruments:
Seagull Merlin dulcitar, Burke tin whistle, Gold Tone tenor guitar, tingsha bells, tambourine

Dark - Eyed Junco

Instruments:
Burke tin whistle, Doug Tipple flute, bongos, conga, frame drum, karatala, egg shaker, shruti box, organ effect on iPad

Downy Woodpecker

Written after seeing a bald eagle fly through the snowy sky above the lake I live beside, while out for a cross country ski. 

Instruments:
Seagull Merlin dulcitar, Burke tin whistle, Gold Tone tenor guitar, Doug Tipple flute, egg shaker, tambourine, triangle, organ effect on iPad, sleigh bells, cymbal

The Eagle In The Snow

Original compositions played upon various acoustic instruments. 

At the moment, the majority of music I record is original folk tunes. Most of these tunes arise whilst out in natural ecosystems or shortly after visiting a natural ecosystem. The titles often reflect an aspect of the ecosystem I had noticed while the tune came about. Lately this is usually a species of bird.

Tin whistles and flutes appear the most often in my recordings; though mandolin, tenor guitar, lyre harp, jaw harp, dulcitar, and a handful of other instruments show up fairly often as well.

And here's some more music I've made along with my friend Dan Jones:
https://soundcloud.com/user-453898279