Plants at western New York park form 'secret symphony' through bioelectrical signals

"BRENT CHANCELLOR: We connected electrodes to plants, recording their bioelectric information and then sending that to a series of composers who created new works. CHANCELLOR: It's an electrical signal that is then converted into MIDI data, and that MIDI data can be assigned to sounds or notes or pitches. CHANCELLOR: So if you think of, like, a keyboard, you have the white notes and the black notes."

"CHANCELLOR: Each note is a half step. Each MIDI data point essentially is associated with that half step, and then you can assign each one of those points a sound. So there are certain rhythms, certain patterns that recur over and over, and you can use those as the foundation for a musical idea. CHANCELLOR: Each composer was assigned one plant. The thing that we did notice was smaller plants tend to have more activity. Moss is really active."

Musicians performed five compositions based on bioelectrical data captured from plants at a park in Lewiston, New York. Electrodes recorded plants' electrical activity, which was converted into MIDI data and mapped to sounds, notes, and pitches. Composers each received data from an assigned plant and used recurring rhythms and patterns as foundations for musical ideas. Smaller plants, such as moss, displayed higher activity, while larger broadleaf plants showed less. The resulting pieces combine instrumental and electronic textures and appear on the album titled The Secret Symphony of Plants.

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