Andrew Bird
Andrew Bird
Andrew Wegman Birdis an American musician, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist. He was initially known through his work with the band Squirrel Nut Zippers before forming Bowl of Fire, and is now best known as a solo musician. Bird's primary instrument is the violin, but he is also proficient at other instruments including whistling, guitar, and the glockenspiel. He wrote "The Whistling Caruso" for The Muppets and performed the whistling heard in both the film and the soundtrack. Bird composed the score...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionRock Singer
Date of Birth11 July 1973
CityLake Forest, IL
CountryUnited States of America
The real drag is trying to fly from country to country, day of show, with all your gear. You get hassled all the time. It's hard trying to keep it together.
I think life is a wondrous thing. I'm happy to try pretty hard.
I'm just trying to get my body in shape so that I can handle it. It's a very physically demanding thing. I've been doing it for 16 years, so I know what I'm going into now. I'm trying to stay calm and not panic.
Every time I get up in the morning, melodies occur to me and I start trying to shape lyrics to melodies.
You're trying to get the lyrics and melody to coexist. And sometimes you're trying to fit a square peg into a round hole.
There was a fascinating handmade poster scene in Chicago in the '90s, and I became friends with many of the artists; the posters were often more impressive than the bands.
My mom had this romantic notion of her children playing classical music. The idea is you learn it when you're still learning language. It's using the same part of the brain.
My head is full of shifting patterns and polyrhythmic stuff; but I want to use all acoustic instruments and create this kind of tapestry of interlocking lulling parts.
Since I first picked up the violin, I've been very interested in tone and texture: I would have very visceral reactions to the texture of a snare drum or a pedal steel guitar or a violin.
I don't want technology to take me so far that I don't have to use my brain anymore. It's like GPS taking over and losing your internal compass. It's always got to be tactile, still organic.
The fact that I wasn't expected to read music at all and was absorbing everything by ear... it had a huge affect on the kind of musician that I became.
I've always been fascinated and stared at maps for hours as a kid. I've especially been most intrigued by the uninhabited or lonelier places on the planet. Like Greenland, for instance, or just recently flying over Alaska and a chain of icy, mountainous islands, uninhabited.
It only takes a little change to make a SAN not work. The problems aren't noticed until the next failure happens.
Maybe it's just, I've always been to the less traveled places, in any topic, whether it's history, I always like to just choose the most obscure topic. And I don't know why I have that impulse. I can't really explain it but I've been doing that since I was a little kid.