What if the roar of a dinosaur wasn’t what we thought? Not thunderous or terrifying, but something quieter. Resonant. Almost melodic.

At Southern Methodist University, a team of students and researchers is bringing that sound to life through Dinosaur Choir, a project that turns fossil data into playable instruments. Using 3D-printed skulls, breath sensors, and computer modeling, they’re reimagining how dinosaurs may have sounded—and they’re getting global attention for it.

The idea first struck SMU associate professor Courtney Brown on a cross-country road trip. “Dinosaurs were singers,” she realized—and that insight led to more than a decade of work to recreate the voices of creatures that went silent millions of years ago.

Led by Brown, the team recently earned third place at the 2025 Guthman Musical Instrument Competition, which honors the most inventive new instruments from around the world, according to SMU.

During the performance, which you can see here on YouTube, the announcer described a version of the instrument that leverages face tracking, saying, “Using face tracking, the shape of the musician’s mouth influences the pitch.”

That feature—still being developed—is part of the instrument’s evolving design. A 2023 academic paper presented at the International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical Expression (NIME) confirms that face tracking is being added to help performers shape sound in real time, alongside breath control.

Inspired by sound-producing organ in birds

Brown’s digital models are inspired by the syrinx, the sound-producing organ in birds. Some paleontologists believe it may be closer to how dinosaurs vocalized. Her system lets performers toggle between bird-based models like a dove or raven in real time, adjusting variables like trachea length and vocal membrane tension via code.

“Our breath becomes the dinosaur’s breath,” Brown wrote on the project website. “The dinosaur instrument becomes a part of us.”

SMU faculty member Courtney Brown plays a life-sized, 3D-printed Corythosaurus skull during a Dinosaur Choir performance. The instrument, modeled after the duck-billed dinosaur’s resonant nasal crest, is part of a multi-year project reimagining how dinosaurs may have sounded. [Photo: SMU]

How the instrument works

The instrument works like this: You blow into a mouthpiece, the air passes through a vocal mechanism, and then it resonates through a 3D-printed skull. That skull is modeled after a real Corythosaurus fossil—a duck-billed dinosaur scientists believe used its long, hollow crest to make sound.

Inside the instrument, the team uses a synthetic vocal model based on a bird’s syrinx. The instrument is designed to let sound resonate naturally, just as it might have millions of years ago.

Dinosaur Choir builds on Brown’s earlier project, Rawr! A Study in Sonic Skulls, which used mechanical airflow to generate sound. The new system replaces that with computer modeling, letting performers explore dinosaur calls digitally—with more flexibility and creative control.

A 2023 study of a fossilized dinosaur voice box (from an ankylosaur) suggested that at least some dinosaurs may have made sounds more like birds than reptiles. That insight helped shape the current model, which uses bird-inspired sound algorithms, adjusted with Corythosaurus-specific measurements like trachea length and skull shape.

Powered by students 

The instrument is also a showcase of SMU’s First-Year Research Experience (FYRE) program, which gives undergraduates the opportunity to contribute to research from the start of their college journey. Students working on Dinosaur Choir have helped with 3D modeling, digital sound design, and even live performance—gaining hands-on experience at the intersection of science, creativity, and technology. 

The students driving the project forward are gaining hands-on experience that spans code, creativity, and composition. In the SMU announcement, Ella Halverson, a double major in music with voice specialization and psychology, said, “I wasn’t expecting to work on dinosaurs as a freshman in college.”

Her teammate Qien Shensun, a statistical and data science double major, added, “We figured out it’s more like an interaction between dinosaurs, music and codes. Every part is very influential.”

The two have co-authored a research paper with Brown and will perform “Anger at the Asteroid” as the Dinosaur Trio at the International Computer Music Conference in Boston.

Ancient bones, modern collaboration

Dinosaur Choir is built through a wide-ranging collaboration. Brown leads the team at SMU, with design support from Cezary Gajewski, an industrial designer at the University of Alberta. CT scan data and fossil analysis came from paleontologist Thomas Dudgeon, who works with the University of Toronto and the Royal Ontario Museum.

The team envisions future instruments and open-source versions. They also imagine participatory performances that bring together music, science, and imagination.

“Our vision is an entire Dinosaur Choir,” says the project website, “leading to social participatory musical experiences and ensemble musical works, learning and experiencing together music, dinosaurs, technology, and science.”

Next up: Making the tech open source?

The sounds produced by the Dinosaur Choir challenge the cinematic trope of thundering dinosaur roars. Instead, says student researcher Shensun, the instruments generate “lazy sounds, discussion sounds, conversation sounds.”

Fellow performer Halverson sees the project’s potential to inspire: “Imagine how many younger kids or the next generation could interact with this instrument and see in an audio-visual way what a dinosaur sounds like. It’s like going to an aquarium as a kid or a science museum. For some people, it clicks. They’re like, ‘That’s what I want to do.’”

Brown hopes to expand the choir to include additional species and eventually make the technology open source so dinosaur choirs can “pop up everywhere.”

It’s research you can hear—and discovery you can play.

Don’t miss what’s next. Subscribe to Dallas Innovates.

Track Dallas-Fort Worth’s business and innovation landscape with our curated news in your inbox Tuesday-Thursday.