This is Bird Note.

Musician Andrew Bird is known as a songwriter, violinist, and, like his namesake, a virtuoso whist.

When he was about six, he learned to whistle from his grandmother.

This is when I was doing Suzuki violin and you have your like repertoire that you repeat

and play it over and over and over again.

So there's those neuro pathways being formed.

So when I wasn't playing the violin, I was usually whistling the repertoire, whether it was

a folk song or bop or Mozart.

And yeah, the only time I wasn't whistling was when I was eating or sleeping, I guess.

Growing up, Andrew spent lots of time in natural areas, rich with bird life.

My mom tells it that I would go out there age six and try to imitate or communicate with the birds.

My mom tends to embellish her stories quite a bit, so I don't know.

It sounds a little too cute to me, but apparently that's what happened.

Embelished or not, when Andrew was asked in 2020 to contribute to a musical anthology about birdsong,

he found himself reaching for these same skills.

He researched recordings of birds that have gone extinct

and was struck by the story of the Kauai'i-O-O-O.

They captured the song of the last male of the species,

like a meeting call,

but obviously falling on deaf ears

because there were no females left.

What I picked up from it was like this,

...