Today on Mushroom Hour we are blessed by the presence of Noah Kalos, founder of the groundbreaking Youtube and social media channels “MycoLyco”. This work is a blend of his passions for nature, mycology and electronic music. He originally got hooked on electronic music production at the age of 17, but in the past 6 years Noah took that passion to the next level, getting deep into digital music hardware and electrical engineering. Noah majored in studio art at Oberlin College and then spent 5+ years living in the woods transitioning between outdoor roles as a camp counselor and nature therapist. During his time in the wild, he became familiar with all kinds of wild foods and has been a longtime mycology enthusiast. In the wake of the pandemic, Noah decided to focus on growing mushrooms. His plan was to convert his music studio into a mycology lab, but after a fateful connection between mycelium and synth electrodes, the studio and lab became one in the same. Now with his MycoLyco project, Noah has been giving us all a window into the incredible musical frequencies of fungi.

(Intro and Outro music is the sound of mushrooms from the new MycoLyco album!)

Topics Covered:

• Noah’s Origin Story  
• Years Spent Living in Nature  
• Mushroom Cultivation & Cordyceps  
• Marriage of Synth and Mushroom - Birth of Myco Lyco  
• Waves and Resistance Converting into Digital Sounds  
• Biodata Sonification  
• Responses to Stimuli & Rhythmic Spiking Behaviors  
• Hooking up Crystals, Cacti and Orchids to the Synthesizer  
• Unique Hallmarks of Mushroom Sound Waves  
• Is there Sonic Communication Between Mushrooms?  
• Mycelium Sentience  
• Fungi Offering New Perspectives  
• Explosion of Citizen Science and Autodidactic Learning  
• Tips for Exploring Modular Synth  
• Future Plans for Myco Lyco  

Episode Resources:

• Myco Lyco Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsmw-u-2kzPQPO5n9sTpcyA  
• Myco Lyco Tik Tok: https://www.tiktok.com/@mycolyco?lang=en  
• Myco Lyco IG: https://www.instagram.com/mycolyco/  
• Myco Lyco FB: https://www.facebook.com/mycolycomycology/ 
• Midisprout/Plantwave: https://www.midisprout.com/  
• Instruo Scion: https://www.instruomodular.com/   
• MAKEN0ISE YT: https://www.youtube.com/user/MAKEN0ISE  
• Divkid YT: https://www.youtube.com/user/DivKidVideo  
• Andrew is Music YT: https://www.youtube.com/user/songstowearpantsto   
• Arduino Uno: https://store.arduino.cc/usa/arduino-uno-rev3    
• Biodata Sonification Github: https://github.com/13-37-org/midi-biodata