The Poseidon Ensemble “auralises” global earthquake data.

Using 100 years of global earthquake records — a data set that consists of over 780,000 points — creative technologist David Johnston created The Poseidon Ensemble, a generative orchestral composition with accompanying visual animation that runs for almost eight days.

“We hear data when we hear drum patterns and chord progressions, so I set about trying to apply the same principles to a more unpredictable dataset,” Johnson explained to The Creators Project.

“The challenge I faced was giving the listener as much information about a seismic event as possible in only a single note, so I set about experimenting with different techniques.”

In The Poseidon Ensemble, the earth is divided into eight regions that are assigned a particular group of instruments. The magnitude of an earthquake is indicated by the velocity and length of a note, with a sound that is longer and larger representing a larger earthquake. The pitch correlates with the depth of the earthquake.

You can hear excerpts of The Poseidon Ensemble below.