University of Minnesota undergraduate Daniel Crawford combined his studies in environmental science with his passion for music to create “Song of Our Warming Planet.” The piece reflects the earth’s surface temperature changes from 1880 to 2012, with the coldest year (1909) having the lowest note. Crawford was interning for Professor Scott St. George who first suggested he set climate change to music. According to Crawford, he had to calculate the musical range and how much of a temperature change was required to move up one note. “A lot of people still don’t understand the immediacy of climate change,” he says. “If we can raise awareness by putting out this piece of music that can convey this problem, hopefully it will hit home with people.”
This article is from our November-December 2013 issue.
