Since Pythagoras, we have imagined the universe as a vast, resonant instrument—a cosmic harmony waiting to be heard. From Holst’s orchestral visions of the planets to Tuvan throat singing echoing the murmur of rivers, composers have long sought to capture the music of nature and the heavens. Villa-Lobos shaped melodies from landscapes and architecture, just as scientists now transform earthquake tremors and celestial frequencies into sound. This lecture explored the deep connection between music and the cosmos, where all existence vibrates in frequencies—the very essence of pitch, resonance, and melody.
References and Further Reading
Allen, B. (2008) Beethoven’s Natures. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Bellando, N. and Deschênes, B. (2020) ‘The Role of Tone-colour in Japanese Shakuhachi Music’, Ethnomusicology Review, 22(1), pp. 43–60. Available at: https://ethnomusicologyreview.ucla.edu/journal/volume/22/piece/1036
Byrne, D. (2012) How Music Works. Edinburgh: Canongate.
Chatwin, B. (1987) The Songlines. London: Jonathan Cape.
Discovery of Sound in the Sea (2025) ‘History of the SOFAR Channel’. Available at: https://dosits.org/science/movement/sofar-channel/history-of-the-sofar-channel/
Felicissimo, R.P. (2014) Estudo Interpretativo da Técnica Composicional Melodia das Montanhas, utilizada nas peças orquestrais: New York Sky-Line Melody e Sinfonia No. 6 de Heitor Villa-Lobos. PhD thesis. Universidade de São Paulo, Escola de Comunicações e Artes.
Godwin, J. (1993) The Harmony of the Spheres: Kepler to Kircher. Rochester, VT: Inner Traditions.
Levin, T. (2006) Where Rivers and Mountains Sing: Sound, Music, and Nomadism in Tuva and Beyond. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
McBride, G. and Tlusty, T. (2019) Cross-cultural data shows musical scales evolved to maximise imperfect fifths. Available at: https://arxiv.org/abs/1906.06171
McBride, G., Passmore, R. and Tlusty, T. (2023) Convergent evolution in a large cross-cultural database of musical scales, PLOS ONE, 18(1). Available at: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0284851
MacDonald, M.G. et al. (2022) ‘Confirming the 3:2 resonance chain of K2-138’, The Astronomical Journal, 163(2), article id. 162. Available at: https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2022AJ….163..162M/abstract
McGee, R., van der Veen, J., Wright, M., Kuchera-Morin, J., Alper, B. and Lubin, P. (2011) ‘Sonifying the Cosmic Microwave Background’, Proceedings of the 17th International Conference on Auditory Display (ICAD-2011), Budapest, Hungary. Available at: https://web.physics.ucsb.edu/~jatila/papers/SONIFYING%20THE%20COSMIC%20MICROWAVE%20BACKGROUND.pdf
Martineau, J. (1995) A Book of Coincidence: Geometry and Harmony in the Solar System. Powys: Wooden Books.
Mermikides, M. (2025) Hidden Music: The Composer’s Guide to Sonification. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Mermikides, M. and Lintott, C. (2025) Remixing the Music of the Spheres. Gresham College, 20 June 2025. Available at: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/watch-now/remixing-music-spheres
Murphy, S. (2006) ‘The Major Tritone Progression in Recent Hollywood Science Fiction Films ’, Music Theory Online, 12(2). Available at: https://www.mtosmt.org/issues/mto.06.12.2/mto.06.12.2.murphy.html
Rothenberg, D. and Ulvaeus, M. (eds) (2001) The Book of Music and Nature: An Anthology of Sounds, Words, Thoughts. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press.
Slonimsky, N. (1945) Music of Latin America. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell
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This event was on Wed, 25 Feb 2026
Professor Milton Mermikides
- Gresham Professor of Music (2023 – )
Milton Mermikides is a composer, guitarist, technologist, academic and educator in a wide range of musical styles and has collaborated with artists and scientists as diverse as Evelyn Glennie, Tim Minchin, Pat Martino, Peter Zinovieff, John Williams and Brian Eno. Son of a CERN nuclear physicist, he was raised with an enthusiasm for both the arts and sciences, an eclecticism which has been maintained throughout his teaching, research and creative career.
He is a graduate of the London School of Economics (BSc), Berklee College of Music (BMus) and the University of Surrey (PhD). He has lectured, exhibited and given keynote presentations at organisations like the Royal Academy of Music, TEDx, Royal Musical Association, British Library, Smithsonian Institute and The Science Museum and his work has been featured extensively in the press. His music, research and graphic art are published and featured by Oxford University Press, Cambridge University Press, Deutsche Grammophon, Sony and more, and he has won awards, scholarships and commendations for writing, teaching, research and his charity work.
Milton is Professor of Music at the University of Surrey, Professor of Guitar at the Royal College of Music, Deputy Director of the International Guitar Research Centre, an Ableton Certified Trainer, and lives in London with his wife, the guitarist Bridget Mermikides and their daughter Chloe. He is also a Vice-Chair of Governors at Addison Primary School, a state school which foregrounds music education, offering free instrumental lessons for all on Pupil Premium.
https://www.surrey.ac.uk/people/milton-mermikides
helen the hare 