January 11 2019

Music of the Spheres: inspiration from the heavens

The ancient Pythagorean concept of ‘music of the spheres’ regards proportions in the movements of star and planets as assigned musical values. This ‘music’ is not usually thought to be literally audible but a harmonic, mathematical or religious concept.

Further scientific exploration has determined specific proportions when orbiting bodies exert a regular, periodic gravitational influence on each other, described as orbital resonance. Here on planet Earth, there has also been the recent discovery of the Schumann resonances (named after physicist Winfried Otto Schumann), a geomagnetic wave frequency created from the earth and the ionosphere which oscillates at a frequency of 7.8 cycles per second. This same frequency has been correlated with alpha brain wave patterns associated with states of deep meditation (Source)…perhaps one explanation for feeling ‘grounded’ in mediation practice.

Vancouver Cantata Singers next performance, Musica Universalis: Music of the Spheres, explores these concepts in a variety of choral works such as Stars by Latvian composer, Erik EÅ¡envalds. This work features water-tuned glasses and voices. Listen to the work below and hear it live by Vancouver Cantata Singers on Saturday, February 23rd.