Musical termites? What happens when you let nature sing
1/27/202646 min
Animals and music? What a tantalizing mix! In a fascinating conversation with scientist and musician Dr. Diego Ellis Soto we learn about the way animals move - through music. When animals swarm, mill, or migrate, patterns are revealed. Soto explains that animals all prefer to move together with proper space, time, and direction....just like harmony in music.
Soto’s work combines his academic work and his passion for music to create a fresh look at how we should think about nature in motion. It is a way to express complex data about animal movement in a wa...
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First 90 secondsSpeaker 10:00
You know, every day on Up First, NPR's Golden Globe-nominated morning news podcast, we bring you three essential stories. At the heart of each story are questions. What really happened? What really mattered? What happens next? At NPR, we stand for your right to be curious and to follow the facts. Follow Up First wherever you get your podcasts and start your day knowing what matters and why.
Chris Morgan· Host0:22
Hi, wild listeners. This is a fun episode. I know a lot of you, like myself, are music lovers as well as nature lovers, so we're all in for a treat. Before we start, I want to invite you to join our Patreon, where you can find bonus content that didn't make it into the wild episodes and extended interviews and extra bits and pieces with our favorite guests. The link is in the show notes. Okay, enjoy the show. [gentle music] I love music. Maybe you do too, but where this music came from might surprise you. This is from a band made up of insects. No, not The Beatles. That would be way too predictable and way too cheesy a joke. Not Beatles, but something pretty close. Termites.
Diego Ellis-Soto· Guest1:15
[gentle music] So this was all done by the termites themselves. What you hear is a, a layer of four different instruments, actually. Three of them are a piano and one is a guitar.