Lockdown has given us a surplus of empty days to finally do whatever we want. For many of us, “doing whatever we want” has involved having an identity crisis after discovering that we have no talents or hobbies outside of work. But some people, post-crisis, managed to find something they were really quite good at.
A member of the Maglio family of Nokomis, Florida, for example, discovered during lockdown that they had a secret singing talent. Tico, a double yellow-headed Amazon parrot, had started to showcase her impressive vocal range while cooped up at home with the rest of her family, and dad Frank jumped at the opportunity to use this to his advantage.
As it turned out, Frank was a guitar player, and he’d been looking for a singer to accompany his music for a while now. Usually, Frank would take on the singing himself – but he didn’t need to do that anymore!
Sharing a video of Frank and Tico performing Frank’s “own riff” together to Sharedots, Tico’s mom said,
“We decided to film this and share it with our family and friends. Everyone seemed to really enjoy the video and started sharing it with their friends. People started requesting for Tico to sing more songs.”
As soon as the video begins, we already know we’re in for a treat, as Tico is caught mid-high note, her neck stretched, giving us an immediate taster of her sensational singing voice.
Frank begins to play the guitar, and Tico begins to sing. We can’t be sure whether she’s making it up as she goes along, or whether this song has been tried and tested multiple times, but she certainly knows what she’s doing.
Tico’s singing combines more typical parrot whistling with high pitched screaming (which sounds terrible, but is actually very in tune). Frank, for his part, is an excellent guitar player, but it’s clear that Tico has stolen the limelight in this particular performance.
As the song progresses, Tico gives us something a little different with a lower, throatier pitch. Now she sounds more like a haggard rock singer attempting a high note (again, very in tune). And then all too soon, Frank stops strumming, and the short performance is over.
Clearly quite a humble parrot, Tico heads off to the back of the cage she’s standing on, bowing away from her audience (or maybe she was just snacking on some birdseed).
Then she turns around and stares forward at where her crowd would be, giving them a long, intense look.
Though “Tico and the Man”, as they’re dubbed, might not have had a real audience to perform to, they had plenty of impressed fans online. On YouTube, the video has more than 28,000 views already, and commenters are full of praise.
One person wrote:
“Oh my goodness, the voice, the stance, the pose, the passion! Hahaha….she’s fantastic.”
Someone else said:
“I love all your videos! I don’t think it’s any coincidence that your bird harmonizes most beautifully with a riff of your own creation.
This made my whole day Frank!”
Yep, Frank and Tico are not one-hit wonders. On their YouTube channel, you can also find videos of them riffing to Billy Idol’s “Eyes Without a Face” and Supertramp’s “Give a Little Bit”, to name a few. This double act are versatile – and they’re here to stick around!
You can check out the adorable video of Tico doing her thing just below.
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