It appears some science nerd artist Bartholomäus Traubeck was clever enough to figure out how to rig some science and audio gear together and “read” the growth rings of trees. It’s really quite beautiful.
The tree rings are actually being translated into the language of music, rather than sounding musical in and of themselves. According to Makezine, the custom record player takes in data using a PlayStation Eye Camera and a stepper motor attached to its control arm, and relays the data to a computer. A program called Ableton Live then uses it to generate an eerie piano track.
I so stole this from Livescience, read their full post here.