The Amazing Response of Plants to Music

In recent years, many experiences have been conducted playing music to plants. In 1957, Arthur locker experimented with playing music to his greenhouse. He noticed that his plants grew straighter, developed quicker, and bloomed more abundantly. Eagene Canby, who was from Canada, played Bach’s sonatas to his plants and found that they grew 66% greater than the plants without music. When George Smith, in 1960, conducted the first scientific experiment, planting corn and soybeans in a greenhouse under the same conditions and playing music 24 hours a day, he found that the plants weighed 40% more that other plants.

In 1970, Dorothy Retallack experimented with playing music to marigolds and beans. Her findings were astounding! She noticed that the plants grew toward the speakers when she played the works of Hayden, Brahms, Beethoven, and Schubert. She also discovered that when she

played the music of Led Zappenlin, Vanilla Fudge, and Jimi Hendrix, that the plants leaned away from the speakers. No matter how she oriented her plants, they grew to either escape or embrace the music. Recording a Spanish folk song once played with a string ensemble, and again with

steel drums, she found that the plants leaned ten degrees away from the speakers when the steel drums version were played. Amazingly, when she played the string version of the song, the plants leaned ten degrees toward the speakers.

Increasingly, many more experiments were conducted watching the rate and size of the growth of plants “listening” to music, and that of those that were not. The scientist found that when Bach’s organ music was played, the plants leaned 35 degrees toward the speakers. But nothing compared to R. Shanker’s music! The plants sometimes bent horizontal toward the speakers. Folk and country western music did not effect the plants at all. Significantly, the most stunning results were those of Jazz. Although the plants grew taller and leaned toward the speakers, they had scrawny roots and needed a much larger amount of water.

By looking at the rates of the growth of plants listening to the different types of music, makes us think of what those kinds of music do to the brain development to young children. I think a lot of us will be changing our music style!

~Susi Van Criss