Alex Barnett (Flatiron Institute)
TITLE
A tour of the mathematics of music and sound
ABSTRACT
Music and sound are part of all cultures and critical to human and animal communication. Yet mathematics is crucial for understanding why instruments (including the voice) sound like they do, what frequencies sound harmonious or dissonant, how strings and objects vibrate or resonate, how our ears and brains analyze sound, and how sound waves propagate in and are changed by an architectural space. Why can't the musical interval called a perfect fifth be "perfect", and how does this affect musical tuning? Why does one hear a "chirp" when one claps in a racquetball court? We will take a tour of such questions and phenomena, explaining how applied mathematics underlies each. The lecture will include some live demos with instruments and sounds, and live sound analysis with the "spectrogram" (time-frequency analysis). No musical training is required to enjoy the lecture, and the mathematics needs only ratios, simple graphs, and trigonometry (although of course there will be pointers to more advanced areas!).
PLACE
Hybride - CRM, Salle / Room 6214, Pavillon Andr茅 Aisenstadt
or by Zoom