Wolfram Tones
I actually bought Stephan Wolfram's "A New Kind of Science" when it came out. It now sits, all five and a half pounds of it, right next to Hofstadter's "Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid". They look impressive together, but it's a little embarrassing to have a whole shelf devoted to books I once meant to finish but long ago stopped pretending that I ever would.
Wolfram's book was a big deal when it came out in 2002 or so and I remember being excited by some of the ideas, although I'm not sure all the hype is/was warranted. One problem I had was that it wasn't clear enough what the practical applications could be. But Stephen has been busy and one of many sites devoted to the theories in the book is tones.wolfram.com which uses algorithms to generate music. It's a comprehensive tool and it's possible to get actually good music from it. Play around for a few minutes and you'll get some crud, some tolerable pieces, and one or two impressive little songs.
from Mike C.