Mozart once kept a starling as a pet and musical companion. One of his notebooks compares a passage from the last movement of the Piano Concerto in G Major with the same passage as the starling revised it: The bird imitated it closely, but changed the sharps to flats. Mozart's verdict? Das war schon!("That was beautiful!")

[Many species (the song sparrow for example) sing in sonata form: opening theme, exposition, return to theme. Alas, the Soccorro mockingbirds, which sing in counterpoint, are losing their habitat to sheep and a quail species which Beethoven, Haydn and Schubert all echoed in their compositions has disappeared from parts of Europe.]