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Creative collaboration highlights the wonder of birds in the Roaring Fork Valley

Picnickers listen to classical music at the Aspen Center for Environmental Studies’ Hallam Lake Nature Preserve on Saturday, July 27, 2024. Students from the Aspen Music Festival and School were dispatched to several locations in the Roaring Fork Valley over the weekend for live performances in a collaboration with The Birdsong Project and the National Audubon Society.
Kaya Williams
/
Aspen Public Radio
Picnickers listen to classical music at the Aspen Center for Environmental Studies’ Hallam Lake Nature Preserve on Saturday, July 27, 2024. Students from the Aspen Music Festival and School were dispatched to several locations in the Roaring Fork Valley over the weekend for live performances in a collaboration with The Birdsong Project and the National Audubon Society.

The Birdsong Project has inspired hundreds of artists to record music and poetry about birds, with the idea that art can motivate people toward conservation action.

The project is a collaboration with the National Audubon Society — and over the weekend, the two organizations teamed up with several local nonprofits for a program billed as the “Summer of Birds.”

At the Aspen Saturday Market, a crew from Audubon tried to recruit members, while students from the Aspen Music Festival played flute and clarinet. Meanwhile, at the Aspen Center for Environmental Studies, a string quartet was on tap; they played a selection of classical music with avian inspiration, following a talk with Audubon’s chief scientist Chad Wilsey.

In an interview with Aspen Public Radio, Wilsey said forms of creative expression can show people the wonder of birds in a new way.

“Art is taking patterns and things that we experience, and sometimes like magnifying them, right?” Wilsey said. “And so sometimes you can even, from the art, have a more intense experience than from the birdsong itself.”

That was evident during Wilsey’s presentation, which included tracks from the Birdsong Project and a video of artist Mike Fernandez’s snowy owl painting for the Audubon Mural Project. Wilsey also demonstrated Audubon’s Bird Migration Explorer — a data-based visualization of migration patterns and conservation challenges that could itself be considered art. (The migration pathways are akin to brushstrokes, while conservation challenges feature shaded hexagons in a honeycomb-esque design.)

“The majesty, the awe-inspiring journeys that migratory birds travel, you can certainly talk about it and you can give statistics, but to see it is really where you're kind of blown away,” Wilsey said.

The “Summer of Birds” program continued on Sunday, with a morning bird walk and more live music at Coffman Ranch. That was followed by a performance at Mountain Fair with Roaring Fork Valley musician Natalie Spears, whose latest album features the call of the sandhill crane. Earlier this summer, the initiative included art classes at Anderson Ranch Arts Center in Snowmass Village and birding excursions with Roaring Fork Audubon.

The local collaboration was sparked by a connection with Woody Creek artist Isa Catto — who is herself a bird enthusiast. She drew inspiration from the Birdsong Project for her own original artwork.

Kaya Williams is the Edlis Neeson Arts and Culture Reporter at Aspen Public Radio, covering the vibrant creative and cultural scene in Aspen and the Roaring Fork Valley. She studied journalism and history at Boston University, where she also worked for WBUR, WGBH, The Boston Globe and her beloved college newspaper, The Daily Free Press. Williams joins the team after a stint at The Aspen Times, where she reported on Snowmass Village, education, mental health, food, the ski industry, arts and culture and other general assignment stories.
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