Music from Plant Biosignals: A Conceptual and Analytical Orientation

Abstract

This paper provides a broad but comprehensive foundation for understanding the widespread practice of using the bioelectric properties of plants to create music and sound. We begin by describing how plant biosignals are harvested by several commercial electronic devices and a custom-designed interface. Then, we analyze large data samples of potential musical content generated by such technologies. Next we investigate the artistic and musical choices artists make when they interpret this data, analyzing work by British sonic artist Augustine Leudar, the Philadelphia Museum of Arf s Data Garden Quartet, and Japanese composer Mamoru Fujieda. Finally we position the entire enterprise within a posthumanist semiotic framework, specifically referencing work by Uexküll, Deleuze, Krampen, Watkins, and Marder. This interpretation allows us to speculate on the nature of communication and musical collaboration that can potentially take place between the human and vegetative domains.