Sound/Waves

Sound/Waves creates ambient music from live ocean data pulled from NOAA buoys around North America.

The music is synthesized in real time within the app based on data that is updated every 10 minutes; nothing is pre-recorded.

I built Sound/Waves as a composer and surfer. I want the music to create an immediate sonic image — clear enough to give a surfer some idea of current ocean conditions — while also engaging the listener with subtle, constantly changing variations in harmony, timbre, dynamics, and melody.

There are two models, Spectral and Chromatic.

SPECTRAL

The Spectral model transposes ocean wave frequencies into the range of human hearing. These are extremely low: a 15-second wave is just 0.067 Hertz (Hz). Multiply by 1000 and you get 67 Hz, about two octaves below Middle C on a piano.

Using this method for the 46 discrete wave bands reported by NOAA buoys every hour allows you to "hear" which waves have the most energy at that particular point in the ocean, at that particular time.

CHROMATIC

The Chromatic model maps the same data surf reports use — wave height, wave period, wind speed, tide, and others — to musical parameters such as harmony, rhythm, and timbre.

wave height → polyphony wave period → amplitude wave quality → harmony swell direction → tuning wind → timbre tide → reverb

A large groundswell with ideal wind conditions, for example, will create stacked, widely spaced, consonant chords with a smooth timbre, breathing in and out with the slow wave period.

Choppy, short period wind waves will have a quicker rhythm and sound harmonically dissonant, with a distorted texture.

VISUALS

Sound/Waves also has a visual component.

The tiled photos are taken automatically every hour by the buoys themselves, looking out in six directions.

If a buoy snaps its photo while on the crest of a wave, the normally flat horizon tilts to a jagged angle.

Scan mode crossfades the images between locations, creating an abstract, painterly drift that shifts with the time of day. Sunrise and sunset are bright pastel. Occasionally a boat or ship appears like a ghost, then fades away. Night images can show the moon and other strange colors amidst the black. A migrating bird may get caught in the frame.

The scan rate — how fast the images crossfade — can be set from fast to slow, or turned off altogether.

These buoy images convey a sense of isolation and non-intention that I want the music to amplify.

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Sound/Waves requires an internet connection to fetch current observations. Ocean and weather data courtesy of NOAA's National Data Buoy Center and NOAA Tides & Currents. Sound/Waves is not affiliated with or endorsed by NOAA. Data is provided as is and is not for navigation.