Sounds and Vocal Behavior

The song of Slaty-backed Nightingale-Thrush is poorly studied but several enthusiastic anecdotes appear in the literature. Stolzmann (in Taczanowski 1884) wrote of C. f. mentalis in Peru, "...le chant quoique compose de quelques notes, par leur purete et luer son agreable place cet oiseau au nombre des premiers artistes de cette region. Ordinairment je l'ai entendu chantant deux a la fois." ( "...although the song consists of few notes, by their purity and their pleasant sound place this bird among the top artists of this region. Ordinarily, I heard singing two at a time"). Hilty (2003) describes the song as "dreamy, mesmerizing...phrases halting and hypnotic, as if disembodied from bird and floating eerily through forest." Similarly, Todd and Carriker (1922) found the song "almost impossible to locate".

For a representative audio recording with sonogram, see audio

Calls include "a catlike meeaaaaaah or meeow and a more buzzing wheeety or whewty weer; also a high-pitched whistling poeeee and a low, grating khroum-khroum" (Clement 2000). No information on geographic variation. More study needed.

Countersinging males occasionally snap the bill audibly (MRH, personal observations).