Even though fractal art is best known as a spectrum of the visual arts, its algorithms are also converted to musical rhythms. In that case, fractal music generators analyze the patterns produced by the fractal formulas and interpret the output as sound patterns according to the parameters (pitch, duration, tonality, instruments, etc.) the user sets.

The following samples are some of my first and only experiments with fractal music (and I’m no musician, so take that into account before playing them). They were created between 1999 and 2002, to include that aspect of fractal art –beyond the visual– on this website. If anything, do not consider them as true fractal music; I’m sure a five year old with a synthetizer could do a better job. I’ve uploaded them only to illustrate that fractals not only produce pictures, but melodies as well.

These basic attempts at fractal music were created using several freeware software packages, mainly MusiNum, Mandelbrot Music, and LMUSe (for more information on fractal music generators visit the Software section). The files are available in 128 kbps MP3 format, but the original files were recorded as MIDI files. If you really want to hear what true fractal music is all about, follow the links below instead.

Fractal music information and composers