Juneberry Sings Bird by Bird

Anne Lamott’s book about writing was titled after her father’s advice to her younger brother. When her brother was overwhelmed by a report about birds due in 5th grade and exclaimed, “How will I ever write this?” their father said, “Bird by bird.” This concert season, Juneberry took on a big project — an 11-minute new piece commissioned from composer Travis Ramsey, who chose to set the Wallace Stevens poem, “Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird,” to music. It’s an unusual piece which uses some minimalist techniques to create a spare, sometimes spooky soundscape.

Breaking big projects down into manageable steps may not seem like your typical concert theme — but it leads us to a union labor song, an Argentinean setting of “La Paloma”, a jazz standard, a piece Mozart composed for a family of friends, and more… oh, and there may or may not be rubber duckies involved!