Welcome to the Grooved whale project

Humpback whales provide a powerful model for understanding the relationship between communication complexity and social complexity. Their songs exhibit a clear hierarchical structure, in which simple units (notes) combine into phrases, phrases into themes, and themes into complete songs. This rule-based organization is not arbitrary but can be measured mathematically, following statistical patterns such as Zipf’s Law.

Their songs are culturally transmitted rather than genetically fixed, and populations can rapidly shift to entirely new songs in events known as “song revolutions.” Song structure is also shaped by social and reproductive dynamics, particularly in mating systems where males compete for access to females. In this context, song functions as a display signal that helps mediate male–male competition and supports broader social organization.

Together, these features demonstrate that humpback whale song is both highly structured and socially driven, making it an important system for studying the evolution of complex communication.

Current methods of whale song analysis often isolate individual components without integrating them into a cohesive system that captures the song’s full complexity. By applying a music-based framework, I identify the underlying rules and logic that shape its evolving structures, offering insight into the cognitive capacities of the mind composing the song.

My work focuses on rhythm. As biologist Roger Payne observed, there are striking parallels between human and whale rhythmic organization; I build on this idea by proposing that both species are shaped by a shared temporal architecture—a deeply encoded foundation that can support the development of a universal communication protocol through a shared syntax.

Ultimately, this approach contributes to the development of intelligence filters: logics of organization that transform speculative variables in the Drake Equation, such as intelligence and communicative detectability, into measurable biological markers.

My creative–analytical practice focuses on developing models for hybrid musical works that blend the architectures of whale and human song across a continuum of “human-ness” and “humpback-ness.” These models interact dynamically, generating a wide range of expressive outcomes depending on the input and system parameters.

By feeding in recordings I have collected over the years, the system learns patterns of song evolution, with the long-term goal of applying mathematical logic to generate prototypes of future song forms and map possible evolutionary trajectories. This approach opens the possibility of anticipating how songs may develop over time, suggesting what a population’s song might sound like in the future.

Ultimately, this work aims to model the internal logic of the whale as a continual composer, offering a framework for exploring the creative processes of a non-human species from within its own structural and perceptual system.

 While my investigative work aims to better understand the internal logic of whale song, my creative practice explores the possibilities that come with the development of a shared syntax. My primary method involves interactive encounters with humpback whales, focusing on real-time, dynamic communication - currently mediated through my violin. Rather than simply playing for them, I listen closely to their vocal patterns and respond using approaches that range from direct mimicry to adaptive interpretation.

As we “play” together, I continuously adjust tone, timing, and phrasing to align with their signals, creating a shared perceptual space. These interactions function as experimental dialogues, allowing me to test how a framework of structural rules might enable cross-species communication while testing ideas for prototyping first contact with non-human intelligences.