Planetary Bands: How global warming data was made into music
Do you ever wonder if our planet could speak, what it would say? Well, the truth is our planet is speaking to us constantly. This isn’t a play on a science fiction movie or book; when you look at the weather, the climate, and a range of other different pieces of data, the changes displayed are our planet’s way of communicating. Unfortunately, the Earth has been screaming for some time now, but we don’t want to listen.
It’s a harsh truth that global warming is one of the biggest threats that our planet currently faces. As temperatures rise and we don’t act quickly enough to get on top of an ever-changing climate, persistent changes will impact people worldwide. Our planet is trying to tell us about this.
How it tells us is often subtle, as steady increases in average temperatures every year, which scientists monitor, can be recorded. Sometimes, its form of communication is much more obvious, as crops don’t grow, areas flood, and fires erupt. Regardless of the means by which it tries to speak to us, it appears some people are completely unwilling to listen.
It begs the question: what is the most effective way to deliver this message? Many would argue that music is a universal language, enabling people from all corners of the globe—perhaps even beyond—to connect and communicate. There is certainly merit to this argument. If music weren’t universal, transcending borders and language barriers, then bands would only find success in countries where their language was spoken. However, the extensive tour schedules of any popular rock band clearly demonstrate that this isn’t the case.
Maybe, given the versatility of music, if we could put the current predicament our planet is in into music, people would pay more attention. Well, that’s precisely what Daniel Crawford did. An undergraduate student from the University of Minnesota, Crawford has an affinity for making music using data as opposed to intuition. This is called “data sonification”, which means to convert facts and figures into sound and melody.
One instance of this was when he made the song ‘Planetary Bands, Warming World’, a track in which he assigned different pieces of information to instruments and sounds to specific forms of data. As a result, he was able to highlight the persistently changing temperature of our planet in a song.
“Each instrument represents a specific part of the Northern Hemisphere,” he explained, “The cello matches the temperature of the equatorial zone. The viola tracks the mid latitudes. The two violins separately follow temperatures in the high latitudes and in the arctic.” He went on to explain the pitch, saying it “Is tuned to the average annual temperature in each region, so low notes represent cold years and high notes represent warm years.”
As a result, Crawford has been able to translate the planet’s changing temperature into music. What is alarming about the piece is how quickly the notes of some of the instruments change, perfectly highlighting the planet’s increasing temperature. Since facts and figures don’t seem to work, maybe the dire situation in the song will be more effective.
