Stellar Seismologists Record "Music" From Stars

niktemadur writes "The BBC reports that a French team of stellar seismologists, using the COROT Space Telescope, have converted stellar oscillations into sound patterns, a relatively new technique that, according to Professor Eric Michel of the Paris Observatory, is already giving researchers new insight into the inner workings of stars. The subtly pulsating, haunting sounds are very similar to artist Aphex Twin's minimalistic nineties album 'Selected Ambient Works, Vol. 2,' only stripping away what little melody it had and leaving just the beat. These and many more recordings from space can be accessed at the Jodrell Bank Center for Astrophysics website, also known as the Jodcast."

Re:Beat?

[mechanyx]

A number of pieces are accepted to have no beat and there is a variety of music thought to be ametrical or with long periods of ametricity. Take Penderecki's Threnody for the Victims of Hiroshima or Xenakis' Metastasis for example. I've written a number of ametrical works. There are even works with percussion that could be argued to be ametrical such as the opening and title track to Gorgut's Obscura.

Re:Beat?

[mechanyx]

In Formalized Music Xenakis details a lot of his mathematical process but a statement like, "that the listener can relate to" makes a LOT of assumptions about the listener. I certainly wouldn't identify a beat with those hits. Everything in sound has an underlying mathematical structure. It doesn't mean that structure necessarily translates to anything higher order or is perceptible.

Re:Ancient theory proven

[Jabbrwokk]

Good point. But I believe morning stars is another term used to describe angels (Isaiah 14:13-14 KJV):

How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations! For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north: I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High.

And apparently there's a link to the Latin root of Lucifer. [wikipedia.org]

Conclusion: Lucifer was thrown out of heaven for singing too loud and messing up the Music of the Spheres.

Not the sound of the stars.

[Anonymous Coward]

There are a million different ways you could convert any data into audio.

How do the audio recordings relate to the radio signals they received? Without that information, the audio is meaningless. I could make spacey sounding haunting oscillations from data about the movements of my bowels, it's all about how you represent the data.

The only time I have heard true 'sounds from space' is from VLF radio, as the radio frequencies are actually in the audio range.