Chris Wood did a study/composition project a couple of years ago (don't know if he's published any of it yet) where he recorded people speaking, telling stories of their lives etc and then he took the recordings and tried to break down the sound patterns to make pieces of music. He was very much following this idea - he has also talked about the landscape shaping the spoken and musical sound i.e. the grassy flowing downs tunes are 'rolling' and the northumbrian craggy tunes are 'jumpy'.

Not sure if I was very impressed with either theory/result, but an interesting subject.