Space: the final frontier for music. January 2009

 

Space: the final frontier for music. Thursday 15 January 2009

In April 1990, NASA launched the world's first space-based optical telescope - named after American astronomer Edwin Powell Hubble. In late 2008, NASA launched the final maintenance mission in the telescope's 20 year life. So what better time to consider how western composers and musicians have sought to represent 'the universe' or 'the cosmos' or simply 'space'.   The Ancient Greeks (e.g. philosopher Aristotle) believed that the universe consists of a number of transparent, concentric spheres, each rotating at uniform speeds within each other. The outermost sphere is the unchanging heavens, while the intermediary spheres contained the various planets, with the Earth at the centre (See Diagram 1). Greek mathematician and astronomer Pythagoras (582-496 BC) believed that the rotating spheres are related by the whole-number ratios of pure musical intervals, creating a cosmos in constant motion and in perfect musical harmony - a state described as 'musica universalis' (lit. ‘music of the universe' or 'music of the spheres'). Each sphere emits a specific tone depending on its specific orbit, as a guitar string's tone depends on its length. This 'music' is not literally audible but expresses a mathematical or harmonic idea.   English philosopher Robert Fludd (1574-1637) devised a three octave celestial scale linking sub-planetary worlds to angelic choirs beyond the stars in a Great Chain of Being (See Diagram 2).
Musica universalis from Music of the Spheres by Mike Oldfield (Mercury Records, 2008)	More recently - in 2008 - English composer and multi-instrumentalist Mike Oldfield (of Tubular Bells fame) released an album called Music of the Spheres. The marketing material, states that The title refers to Oldfield's belief that music should aim to represent the spiritual or other-worldly elements of life - something beyond the mundane and everyday'. This isn't, of course, what everyone before him meant by the phrase!
Music of the Spheres from The Earth Sings Mi Fa Mi by The Receiving End of Sirens (Triple Crown Records, 2007)	In the Middle Ages, western views of the universe underwent a revolution. Nicolaus Copernicus (1473-1543), a Polish astronomer and mathematician, posed the first scientifically based model of a heliocentric universe, which became the accepted view of the relationships between the sun and the planets.   However, the 'musica universalis' theory remained popular in medieval Europe. For example, the German mathematician, astronomer and astrologer Johannes Kepler (1571-1630) believed that the Earth's tonal signature oscillates - mi, fa, mi on the scale - as it orbits the sun, in an endless cycle of misery (by which he meant emptiness) and famine (i.e. a desire for things). In 2007, Boston experimental rock band The Receiving End of Sirens released an album called The Earth Sings Mi Fa Mi (Triple Crown Records). It includes an instrumental track called … 'Music of the Spheres'!
Kepler's work on planetary motion led to Isaac Newton's discoveries concerning dynamics and gravity. Newton's work survived into the late 19th century, when it began to show its limits at sub-atomic scales, prompting the emergence in the early 20th century of Quantum Theory and Relativity. Each offered opportunities to integrate the small world of sub-atomic particles with the big world of the universe.   As part of that tumult, American astronomer Edwin Powell Hubble made two discoveries in the 1920s that changed how humanity thought about its place in the universe: first, our own Milky Way is but one of many galaxies in the universe; second, the universe is expanding - a notion that led to the currently accepted 'Big Bang' theory of how the universe originated.   So composers and musicians in the Twentieth Century faced perhaps the musical challenge - how to represent the infinity of space in and through music?
Neptune, the Mystic by Gustav Holst, from The Planets. The Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, conductor Herbert Von Karajan (Polygram, 1991).	English composer Gustav Holst's life (1874-1934) spanned the shift from Newtonian to post-Newtonian physics. The Planets is astrological, not astronomical (hence there is no 'Earth'): each movement illustrates how a planet influences the human psyche.   However, two movements would influence later composers of 'space' music: Neptune, the Mystic; and Jupiter, the bringer of Jollity. They expressed a tension that would dominate 'space' music for much of the rest of the century. Neptune, the Mystic represented infinite space through ethereal strings, a celestial choir … and lots of echo!
Jupiter, the bringer of Jollity by Gustav Holst, from The Planets. The Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, conductor Herbert Von Karajan (Polygram, 1991).	In the face of the literally awe-some, almost unthinkable idea of infinite space, humanity is insignificant, yet Jupiter, the bringer of Jollity is suffused with triumphalism (later justified as humanity took its first steps into space). It also features a contrasting sentimental (i.e. 'making a direct appeal to the emotions, especially to romantic feelings') theme as if to remind us that people are more than their triumphs. These contrasting ideas and tones will recur.
Theme from The Big Country by Jerome Moross. L'Orchestra Cinematique from Western Film Themes (Metro Music, 2007).	A more recent attempt to represent space musically is the theme tune of the US movie The Big Country (1958. Dir. William Wyler). Its horizon was closer - the wide open spaces of the American mid-west - but its representation of those wide open spaces combined, again the awe, triumph and sentiment that we heard in Neptune and Jupiter.
Wagons Ho! Theme from Wagon Train by Jerome Moross. From 100 Greatest TV Themes. Artists unknown.	There is one more influence to note. Jerome Moross - composer of the theme from The Big Country - also wrote the theme from the 1960s TV series Wagon Train. Gene Rodenberry presented the first series of Star Trek as Wagon Train in space!

 

Theme from Star Trek: The Next Generation by Alexander Courage and Jerry Goldsmith. Artists unknown. (GNP Crescendo, 1991)	Those, then, are the foundations and background to some late twentieth century attempts to represent space musically. All the music is from a television series or a movie, which may explain why it is almost exclusively orchestral. First, the theme from the TV series Star Trek: The Next Generation, in which 'awesome space' precedes a triumphal shout!
Hansen's Message and Humanity Taken by Ron Jones. Artists unknown.	The second series of Next Generation included two episodes called The Best of Both Worlds (I and II). Here are two short pieces from those two episodes, each representing 'awesome space'.
Theme from Battlestar Galactica by Stu Phillips. From 100 Greatest TV Themes. Artists unknown.	One of Star Trek's many competitors (some would say copiers!) has been the Battlestar Galactica brand. The theme from the first television series has little time for awe - it jumps straight in with triumphalism!
The theme from Star Wars by John Williams. From 100 Greatest TV Themes. Artists unknown.	Battlestar Galactic continues to be very popular, but the only real competitor to Star Trek has been the Star Wars brand. The theme combines awe, triumph and sentiment, but keeps them quite distinct from each other.
The theme from Superman (1978) by John Williams. The BBC Orchestra, from The Greatest Film Scores.	The Superman movies aren't about space as such, but the theme tune is interesting because even though it moves from triumph to sentiment, the sentimental piece seems reluctant to discard the march-time of the fanfare.
The theme from Star Trek III (1998) by James Horner, Jerry Goldsmith and Leonard Rosenman. Artists unknown.	The composers of the theme from the third Star Trek movie handled sentiment very differently, building one crescendo after another.
Death is irrelevant by Ron Jones. Artists unknown. (GNP Crescendo, 1991)	The commercial availability of synthesizers in the early 1970s gave composers and performers of 'space' music a musical tool with a scope that was almost as big as their subject. The synthesizer not only produced sounds of awesome scope, it also offered new voices to critics of industrialism and mechanisation. This next piece by Ron Jones comes from The Best of Both Worlds (I and II) in the second series of Star Trek: The Next Generation.
Galaxy Formation. Music composed and performed by David Jacopin. From Nebulas and Galaxies.	Finally, we return to our starting point - the Hubble Space Telescope. Here's a chance to see what a synthesizer can do when combined with pictures from Hubble, courtesy of the European Space Agency:

John Williams also wrote the score for Close Encounters of the Third Kind, which - strangely - lacked a theme tune.