A Microtonal Dolphy
October 11, 2005 #"At home [in California] I used to play, and the birds always used to whistle with me. I would stop what I was working on and play with the birds."
He described how bird calls had been recorded and then slowed down in playback; the bird calls had a timbre similar to that of a flute. Conversely, he said, a symphony flutist recorded these bird calls, and when the recording was played at a fast speed, it sounded like birds.
Having made his point about the connection of bird whistles and flute playing, Dolphy explained his use of quarter tones when playing flute.
"That's the way birds do," he said. "Birds have notes in between our notes-you try to imitate something they do and, like, maybe it's between F and F#, and you'll have to go up or come down on the pitch. It's really something! And so, when you get playing, this comes. You try to do some things on it. Indian music has something of the same quality-different scales and quarter tones. I don't know how you label it, but it's pretty."
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