"Just Warming Up", from The Empty Fields uses surface temperature data to render what climate change sounds like. The GISS (Godard Institute for Space Studies - not too far from Code Owl Studios, The Earthly Frames' HQ) Surface Temperature data set contains monthly mean measurements dating back to 1880. To transform this data to sound, first, a Python script mapped the temperatures to a range of MIDI notes, while also creating drones for years and decades averages.
def step_average(sequence, step):
"""
Creates a shorter, average list of numbers based on the desired steps
Parameters
----------
sequence: list
List of integers or floats
step: int
The number of steps you wish to average. E.g. [1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8] with a step of 4 would return [10,24]
Returns
-------
list
The stepped list result
"""
stepped_sequence = []
step_sequence = []
for sequence_number, sequence_item in enumerate(sequence, start=0):
if sequence_number % step == 0 and sequence_number != 0:
average = get_list_average(step_sequence)
stepped_sequence.append(average)
step_sequence = []
step_sequence.append(sequence_item)
return stepped_sequence
This MIDI was fed through analog and virtual instruments to create the track. You can find the source code here.
Open AI's Open Jukebox, primed with the first ten seconds of "Feel Better Soon" generates some pure weirdness. The third attempt, with spoken word, is particularly out there.