Original version

BBC Radio 3 is a radio channel that started transmitting on the 30th September 1967. It replaced Third Programme.

BBC Radio 3

Radio 3

The Essay Podcast

The Essay

Discussion & Talk

Factual: Arts, Culture & the Media

Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond.

Leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond, themed across a week - insight, opinion and intellectual surprise.

The Essay: The Secret Mathematician

The Essay: The Secret Mathematician: Episode 3: Music

Factual: Science & Nature: Science & Technology

The Secret Mathematician

Episode 3

Episode 3: Music

Music

BBC Radio 3 - The Essay, The Secret Mathematician, MusicClose menu

Mathematician Marcus du Sautoy reveals the maths that inspires the work of musicians.

Mathematician Marcus du Sautoy explores the maths that underpins some of his favourite musical compositions, starting with Philip Glass.

Mathematician Marcus du Sautoy untangles the fascinating maths hidden beneath the surface of some of our great contemporary and historical works of art. In this edition, he starts with composer Philip Glass. 

Maths and music are often coupled together: rhythm, after all, is about counting and harmony is about the numerical relationships between notes. But the mathematical complexity of certain pieces of music, notably by the composer Philip Glass, goes far beyond these basic connections. Glass is the secret mathematician whom Marcus du Sautoy has chosen to focus on in his essay on music. From one of his earliest and simplest compositions 1+1 to his great opera Einstein on the Beach, Glass employs a mathematical method he calls the additive process to compose his work. But Marcus believes that this highly mathematical creative process doesn't produce cold, unemotional music. In fact it appeals to an innate tendency in our brains to seek out and spot patterns.

Glass is not the only secret musical mathematician to feature in Marcus's essay. He also talks about the work of Olivier Messiaen, Arnold Schoenberg and Indian tabla players of the eighth century. Maths pervades the world of music: As Stravinsky once said "the musician should find in mathematics a study as useful to him as the learning of another language is to a poet. Mathematics swims seductively just below the surface.".

Live music and the arts: broadcasts more live music than any other radio network. Classical music is its core. Genres include world and new music, jazz, speech and drama.

Marcus du Sautoy untangles the maths behind great contemporary and historical works of art

Mathematician Marcus du Sautoy untangles the maths hidden beneath the surface of some of our great contemporary and historical works of art

Accessibility links

Programme Index

The Essay

The Secret Mathematician

Episode 3: Music

Genres

Formats

Brand

Series

BBC Radio 3

About BBC Radio 3