Common swift that resemble a crescent or a boomerang. Their call is a loud scream in two different tone pitches, the higher of which issues from the female. They often form 'screaming parties' during summer evenings, when 10–20 swifts will gather in flight around their nesting area, calling out and being answered by nesting swifts. Larger "screaming parties" are formed at higher altitudes, especially late in the breeding season. The purpose of these parties is uncertain, but may include ascending to sleep on the wing, while still breeding adults tend to spend the night in the nest. Swifts may nest in former
Birds in music noises that are inharmonic, working instead with birds with a strong pitch structure like the field sparrow "Spizella pusilla" (Emberizidae), the Eurasian treecreeper "Certhia familiaris" (Certhiidae) and the summer tanager, "Piranga rubra" (Thraupidae). Hollis Taylor argued in her 2017 book that the vocalizations of the pied butcherbird are music, rebutting musicological objections to this in detail. This was accompanied by birdsong-based "(re)compositions" based on avian transcriptions, paired with field recordings from the Australian outback. Birds in music Birds have played a role in Western Classical music since at least the 14th century, when composers such as Jean Vaillant quoted birdsong