Samba & Bird Calls, Other Whistles & Sound Effects

About
Bird Calls & Sound Effects

The term Sound Effect ranges back to the early days of radio. In its Year Book 1931 the BBC published a major article about "The Use of Sound Effects". It considers sounds effect deeply linked with broadcasting and states: "It would be a great mistake to think of them as anologous to punctuation marks and accents in print. They should never be inserted into a programme already existing. The author of a broadcast play or broadcast construction ought to have used Sound Effects as bricks with which to build, treating them as of equal value with speech and music."

Some pieces of music use sound effects that are made by a musical instrument or by other means. An early example is the 18th century Toy Symphony. Richard Wagner in the opera Das Rheingold (1869) lets a choir of anvils introduce the scene of the dwarfs who have to work in the mines, similar to the introduction of the dwarfs in the 1937 Disney movie Snow White. Klaus Doldingers soundtrack for the 1981 movie Das Boot includes a title score with a sonar sound to reflect the U-boat setting. John Barry integrated into the title song of Moonraker (1979) a sound representing the beep of a Sputnik like satellite.

French bird calls and hunting calls, game calls are better documented then any other 19th century bird calls. The largest 19th century manufucturer was probably MANUFACTURE GENERALE D'ARMES FONDEE EN 1830. SAINT-ETIENNE. but there were dozens of other makers. There are French and Belgian collectors. Most of the whistle make the sounds of the animal meant to be chased to draw them near the hunter, but some immitate an animal that would attract a predator, so a fox whistle would make the sound of a squirell or a wounded rabbit. The first documented book is from 1778. It seems that the earlier bird calls were made from wood leather & bone.