Do Plants Have Anything to Do with Music?

At first glance, music and plants seem to belong to different realms - one built of vibration and imagination, the other rooted in soil and sunlight. But if we take the time to listen, truly listen, we may find that the two are far more connected than they seem. Liberty Hyde Bailey often wrote that the natural world "moves in harmony," and though he never focused on music as an art, he understood beauty, rhythm, and quiet attention as essential parts of life. Through that lens, the relationship between plants and music becomes not only plausible, but quite natural.

Plants don't hear music the way we do, yet they are deeply responsive to vibration. Modern botanical research shows that sound waves can influence how plants grow and behave. Certain frequencies can stimulate root growth, strengthen stems, or even shift gene expression. One of the most remarkable observations is that some flowers respond to the sound of a pollinating bee. When a bee approaches and its wings create the right vibration, the flower momentarily increases the sugar content of its nectar, offering a sweet reward. The melody doesn't matter, but the vibration does. Bailey, who saw every plant as "a creature with its own way of life," would have appreciated this sensitivity.

Yet much of the relationship between plants and music unfolds through human hands. Visit a greenhouse or gardener's shed and you might hear music drifting between the pots. It may not be the plants who benefit most, but the people who tend them. Music slows us down, steadies our movements, and encourages us to linger. In that calm, we care more gently. Bailey believed deeply in reciprocity - the idea that when we give our attention to a living thing, our own life becomes richer. If music helps us become more attentive gardeners, then it becomes part of the garden's rhythm.

There are also new, imaginative ways people invite plants into the realm of sound. Artists and scientists have created devices that translate a plant's electrical signals into musical tones. While this doesn't mean a philodendron is secretly composing its own tunes, these sounds invite us to hear plant life differently. The result is less a song and more a bridge. A way for humans to feel the quiet presence of a living organism. Attached is a video of one of these devices hooked to mushrooms for you to listen:

Across cultures, the connection between music and plants is even more long-standing. Instruments fashioned from bamboo, reeds, gourds, and wood remind us that nature has always been part of humanity's creative voice. Many traditions include songs tied to harvests, seasons, and the spirits of the land. For many communities, the forest is not silent at all - it participates in the music of life. Bailey admired this wisdom, believing that rural and indigenous practices held understandings that modern science was only beginning to rediscover.

Plants live within rhythm. They respond to them. They help create them. And perhaps most importantly, they invite us to listen more closely to the earth around us. When we listen to nature whether with instruments, science, or with quiet awe - we discover that the world has been a symphony all along.