While I was idly surfing for piano-related items off Yahoo this evening I discovered this gem: The First Annual "Weirdos" Awards at http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/rolls/20001229/en/the_year_in_weird_1.html "The Most Likely to Turn You Into a Vegetable Award: The music of Meat Loaf, which a study at Britain's Sussex University found to be the single best aural stimulant to encourage plant growth, followed closely by a Rachmaninoff piano concerto." DAVID SPRAGUE (December 30, 2000) ________________________ Before people start recommending that their customers who don't have green thumbs to rush out and buy "Bat Out of Hell" or start playing more Russian pieces on their pianos, here's the scoop from yet another site. For technical reasons I should just link to it but the link may only be temporary, so here goes. I've interspersed some of my own notes. From : http://www.guardianunlimited.co.uk/uk_news/story/0%2C3604%2C183405%2C00.html "Greenhouse rock boosts growth rate of plants Tim Radford, Science Editor Friday March 17, 2000 Plants grow better when there is music in the greenhouse, according to scientists at the University of Sussex. [Other studies show the same phenomenon in the gestation and early growth of human infants as well, although for possibly different reasons. - jm] Wallflowers, busy lizzies, carrots and mung beans exposed to Meatloaf's Bat Out Of Hell for seven days grew measurably faster and stronger than plants cosseted by Rachmaninov's piano concerto No 2. [Perhaps it might be an example of "That which doesn't kill me makes me stronger" - jm] But Peter Scott and a student, Ruth Davies, of the university's botany department may have a disappointment in store for people planning a heavy metal diet for their petunias. It may not be the music - it may just be the extra energy cascading from the speaker units. They used a CD player which played the same music for seven days on end, and then chose their three experimental records. Vegetables liked Meatloaf. Bat Out Of Hell increased both germination rate and root and shoot growth across a wide range of plants. Rachmaninov took them nowhere. [I've heard other people say the same thing! - jm] Unfortunately there is unlikely to be a horticultural hit parade. Dr Scott, who will present his results to a meeting of experimental biologists later this month, suspects it is the energy of the sound that gets the growth going, not the music itself. He thinks the sound boosts growth by producing heat. " _____________________________ John Musselwhite, RPT - Calgary, Alberta Canada http://www.musselwhite.com http://canadianpianopage.com/calgary email: john@musselwhite.com http://www.mp3.com/fatbottom
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