Transcribing birds on a wire

I was on a walk the other day and saw these birds sitting on power lines and immediately spotted their resemblance to a musical staff.

I spent a bit of time massaging this into music. I assumed this was the G clef and that we were in C major. I made some “rules” like the birds sitting low on the wire wire “on the line” and the birds sitting high were in the space. That makes the first note a D and the second a G.

I opened up Ableton Live and mapped out this sequence in the piano roll. Note I also had to make some assumptions about the length of notes. Things don’t line up perfectly, but I also used my ear to come up with a satisfying rhythm.

Once I identified the main melody, I figured out chords that go well in the context and added a bass line. I’m trying to practice my MuseScore transcription skills, too, which resulted in this score:

and, with some added drums, we end up with this little loop:

I really enjoy this kind of constrained creativity prompt as it gives good inspiration and turns the creation process into little separate problems to solve.