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FAQ
Frequently Asked
Questions
- What is “Nature-Based” music? It’s music that looks to nature and all its vibratory patterns for inspiration,.. The Greeks studied Nature to learn about life and to find their place in it When you really dig deeply, even down to the molecular levels of frequency, you find layers and layers of interesting events and meanings. (to top)
- Why do you use scientific frequencies in your art? I use science, usually electromagnetic frequencies from the molecular world, because I want to discover hidden patterns and relationships. If I can hear these patterns I can experience them in a completely fresh way and find the beauty there. That’s the art I’m after. (to top)
- Can you really call the frequencies sound if they are originally on the electromagnetic spectrum? It doesn’t matter to me that the original vibrations were not sound, since they are such close cousins and often contain the same information. For instance, before a sound gets to our brain it goes through a process of being a pressure wave, then an electromagnetic impulse. Same idea with a sound speaker..it goes through both permutations. (to top)
- Is the music supposed to be recognized as ‘scientific’? No. Not really. The science is woven into the fabric of the art. People should be able to enjoy the music without knowing anything about the research behind it. It’s not demonstration music, but hopefully pleasing to the ear. (to top)
- How do you find the original data, and how does it get to be sound? Most of the molecular data comes from spectrographs that I collect in science libraries. Spectrographs list frequencies from almost anything on the atomic level such as DNA, water, hydrogen and oxygen, etc. These are usually on the infrared spectrum. For these fast wavelengths I use a simple formula to convert them to hertz numbers, then bring them down many octaves to where we can hear them. Then I program them into a synthesizer, and compose with them. I also collect frequencies that don’t need converting. Everything starts with math; number. If I can find a number I can use it as a frequency. (to top)
- Does the music move us or touch us in different ways, and can that be proven? Much of what makes up the music is a bit strange to the ear because it uses a tuning system that is highly unusual and full of microtones..tones much smaller than our normal half-steps on a piano such as C to C#. These strange tunings do a wake-up call on the nervous system.they put it on alert. So to begin with our sensitivities are opened up. From there, people have reported that these odd tunings are NOT dissonant or discordant, but actually are soothing and take most people into deep places within themselves. I have no idea, really, whether this is a result of the way I have arranged the sounds or whether it has something to do with the frequencies themselves. It would make sense to me if the body were recognizing its own light patterns from DNA in the sounds it was taking in through the ears, but I can’t prove it. No research has been done. (to top)
- Is anyone else composing like this? Not exactly like this. As far as I know I’m the first and only one doing it. But many musicians are composing using techniques of ‘mapping,’ which simply means translating one thing to another. I’ve heard music from the earth using earth’s vibrations, and space music from NASA recordings. Also, many now are composing using DNA as a template .deriving patterns and having fun with sound translations. There’s a lot of great music out there being inspired directly by nature and the molecules of DNA, but I don’t know of anyone else composing with the vibrations of Larmor frequencies or pulsar spins. (to top)
- What are Larmor Frequencies? Frequencies that are emitted directly from the nucleus of atoms. No one knows why or what they are for. But I’ve collected a bunch of them from the elements. (to top)
- And what have you found of interest with the elements? I’ve found that many of them are very very harmonious with each other. Hydrogen and helium, for example, are in the ratio of a perfect 5th. This is a wonderful confirmation of their original kinship where helium was birthed from hydrogen, because in the physics of harmonics, this is a very powerful relationship and the strongest one after an octave. The 5th is literally birthed from the tone before it. And other elements which bond together such as phosphorus and oxygen have harmonious relationships. (to top)
- And pulsars? They spin and put out a beacon which is fairly regular. I’ve used the data of the spins which create a frequency. And frequency = tone! (to top)
- How do people react to this information when you lecture? They are simply staggered. Fascinated and enchanted. And after all, what is more thrilling than to discover that there’s beauty all around, and inside of your body that you never knew about? And it points so strongly to a sentience, an intelligence within everything. People find great joy and hope in that. I’ll go anywhere to talk about it. My students love it also and of course that’s where I hope it’ll begin to mutate and transform into many art forms. (to top)
- Would you consider yourself New Age? Not really. I would rather think of myself as drawing on an ancient technique of craft, intuition and discovery, rather like Archimedes. I have a very free creative side, but also a kind of stuffy academic love of data, facts, and rigor. I love the research part almost as much as the composing. At the same time I know our present-day science only takes baby-steps towards understanding the vast world of frequencies..both gross and highly refined – like those in the etheric field. The realm of consciousness is hardly understood at all. (to top)
- What’s next for you? I’ll continue to create sound designs for films or performances when asked..this is a recent skill which is a lot of fun. I have a lot of research discoveries that I would like to publish or at least get onto my website, and at least three more CDs I’m dying to do. (to top)
- And these mysterious nature sounds you mention, such as the crickets sounding like a woman’s harmonic choir? That will be a lifetime project.to fool around with slowing down/speeding up sounds using computers to discover mysterious things. I’m absolutely fascinated with this and can’t envision doing anything else. Someday I’d like to take this work into the schools to give children a chance to play with it; to expand it with their own creative sparks. (to top)
