| |
 The
Music of the Spheres : Music, Science, and the Natural Order of
the Universe by Jamie James
For centuries,
scientists and philosophers believed that the universe was a stately,
ordered mechanism, mathematical and musical. The perceived distances
between objects in the sky mirrored (and were mirrored by) the
spaces between notes that formed chordes and scales. The smooth
operation of the cosmos created a divine harmony (perfect, spiritual,
eternal) that composers sought to capture and express.
With The Music
of the Spheres, readers will see how this scientific philosophy
emerged, how it was shattered by changing views of the universe
and the rise of Romanticism, and to what extent (if at all) it
survives today. From Pythogoras to Newton, Bach to Beethoven,
and on into the twentieth century of Einstein, Schoenberg, Stravinsky,
Cage, and Glass, it is a spellbinding examination of the interwoven
fates of science and music throughout history.
|
|
