A video of the universe lit up the projector screen as a small ensemble played an otherworldly melody, taking the audience on an adventure into a black hole galaxy and back. A narrator acted as a tour guide throughout the listeners’ cosmic journey.
Last Saturday in Cochran Chapel, Multiverse @ Andover hosted the Black Hole Symphony by the Multiverse Concert Series. Composer and conductor David Ibbett used scientific data on black holes, collected by the Harvard Center of Astrophysics, to put together the piece. His team used a unique process called sonification.
Ibbett said, “The music is informed by research. We got six scientists [working] with me, each on a different scene in the music, providing data that gets turned into melodies and harmonies that we experience… [black holes] don’t just suck things in like a vacuum cleaner, they also spin up clouds of gas and spit out plasma, and there’s dust ringing the system… [along with] torus, jets of plasma shooting out into space.”
Ibbett continued, “We can spot [each of these things] with a different signature on a different kind of telescope and put together this picture. I spent a long time just trying to figure out what that big picture was, and then I created sonification. I might take a data set like gamma rays fluctuating over time from Quasar and turn that into a melody, where each day gets a different note depending on how intense the radiation was. And that becomes one scene from the symphony.”
The concert was the product of three years of work from a group of scientists, artists, and musicians. Unlike many showcases, the Black Hole Symphony combined the subjects of science and art into one experience. Athena Zhang ’25, who organized the event, highlights the interdisciplinary nature of the concert.
“This is a novel concept, something that most people haven’t seen before and heard. I want people to take away [the fact] that there are so many new things that people can do, so many concepts that you can do that are interdisciplinary, adding two subjects together into one to create something spectacular,” said Zhang.
The ensemble consisted of an unusual combination of soprano, electric guitar, violin, flute, piccolo, and audio backing. The music was paired with visuals from the Boston Museum of Science. Audience member Georgianna Harpole ’25 highlighted the soprano part, sung by Agnes Coakley Cox.
“[The most memorable moment for me was] the singer. There was narration throughout the performance, but when she opened her mouth and began to sing, the whole experience started to align… and [it felt] so much more put together. It began to feel like I was transported, even though the whole time I was listening to and watching, essentially placing myself in the dark in space. Her voice made it all feel so much more real,” said Harpole.
Despite the heart of the symphony being rooted in hard, scientific data, the music still retained an emotional touch because of the musicians. Guitar player Dan Van Hassel mentioned how he wanted to communicate that sense to the audience.
“I mean, from the guitar-playing perspective… because so much of the music is synthesized and electronic, I’m trying to infuse a lot of the human element into my playing just to make sure it’s not all just data and science, [and] that there’s some humanity there too,” said Van Hassel.
Jaylen Daley ’25 emphasized the surprising yet astounding combination of art and science. He encouraged others to show up to more events like the Black Hole Symphony.
“As soon as I heard the genre shift to Breakcore, I heard an Amen Break in the background, which is really fundamental to some styles of hardcore EDM… It took me off guard, and it still went really smoothly… Students need to be out here showing up to these events more and more… A lot of people are missing these opportunities to see the arts and sciences on campus, and this event was like a big, great conglomeration of both, so I was happy to experience it for myself,” said Daley.
The concert was educational in many ways, with a narrator speaking to the audience during gaps in the music and sharing information about the universe and black holes. Ibbett shared an additional message he wanted to convey through the experience.
“The joy of being alive in the universe is the main [message]. I mean, they’re black holes, they’re not some story. They’re really out there, and we can learn about them and experience them through science… I want to get across the message that science and music are for everyone, so we can all experience these things. And we can choose to spend our lives in one or the other or both. You don’t have to choose. You can have a life that combines art and science and gives in a way that matches your full personality,” said Ibbett.
Multiverse @ Andover is made possible by the Office of Dean of Studies and a grant from the Abbot Academy Fund, continuing Abbot’s tradition of boldness, innovation, and caring.
“The music is informed by research. We got six scientists [working] with me, each on a different scene in the music, providing data that gets turned into melodies and harmonies that we experience… [black holes] don’t just suck things in like a vacuum cleaner, they also spin up clouds of gas and spit out plasma, and there’s dust ringing the system… [along with] torus, jets of plasma shooting out into space.”
The Black Hole Symphony works with six scientists and turns their data into melodies.
