Music is something that touches our hearts and it can really change our emotions in so many different ways. This is true of the music that we may listen to on purpose, as well as the music we hear in the background.
Have you ever stopped to consider the music we are listening to when we listen to nature? It doesn’t matter if it is frogs croaking, crickets chirping, or birds singing their melody as they go overhead, it really has a way of touching our hearts.
There is also the simple tree, and it can play music as well. I’m not necessarily talking about the wind whistling through the leaves, I’m talking about the rings on the inside of a tree trunk.
You may not realize this, but an artist named Bartholomaus Traubeck made it possible to listen to the music that comes from a tree trunk. He puts it on a special type of record player and it interprets both the color and texture of the tree rings to make melodies.
Everything from the tree trunk is captured and all you need is a cross-section, and it can begin playing the musical notes and instruments that make it sound so beautiful.
The invention is somewhat simple, as he uses a PlayStation eye camera and a motor for the arm of the record player. The data is collected and transferred to a computer, where it is run through a program called Ableton Live and eventually, turned into piano music.
You only have to listen to the track one time to realize just how mesmerizing it can be. It isn’t like the harmony that you here written by everyday composers, it is a type of beauty that is difficult to describe.
Interestingly, each tree will have a different song because the rings are unique. We look forward to hearing more of this beautiful music.