March of the Bluebirds (Piccolo/Flute & Piano)

Janacek March of the Bluebirds for piccolo and piano (or carillon and tambourine)

In 1924, the seventieth birthday year of Leoš Janáček, he authored a number of musical compositions and literary works that harped back to his youth.  The March of the Bluebirds was written as a reminiscence of Janáček´s youth in the Old Brno Monastery.  The “bluebirds” do not refer to birds but to the light blue robes worn by the choristers at the monastery, which Janáček entered at the age of eleven.  Almost 60 years later during a visit to Berlin he remembered the Prussian troops’ invasion of Brno and, with this in mind, wrote a chamber music miniature with a military element.  Janáček reworked the little march then as a part of the sextet for wind instruments Mládí/Youth (TP 528), in which the jaunty flute theme weaves through the 3rd movement.