Music: The music of particle collisions

The natural world has always been a rich source of inspiration for music. Vivaldi’s Four Seasons and Beethoven’s Pastoral Symphony immediately come to mind as two examples of classical music inspired by nature. And of course there is Holst’s The Planets, which is one of the most celebrated examples of music inspired by the Solar System that I can think of. The ancient Greek philosophical maxim, that astronomy is for the eyes what music is for the ears, still inspires composers today. Indeed, a plethora of approaches to composing music that is inspired by natural science has emerged since The Planets was composed a century ago, and there are many works inspired by physics in particular. The emergence of powerful computing technology enabling the manipulation of large volumes of data, combined with the development of sophisticated modelling and simulation technology, allowed composers to develop approaches to musical composition that are more objectively informed by science rather than merely inspired by it.