The Jazz of Physics: The Secret Link Between Music and the Structure of the Universe by Stephon Alexander (PDF)

Description

More than fifty years ago, John Coltrane drew the twelve musical notes in a circle and connected them by straight lines, forming a five-pointed star. Inspired by Einstein, Coltrane put physics and geometry at the core of his music. Physicist and jazz musician Stephon Alexander follows suit, using jazz to answer physics’ most vexing questions about the past and future of the universe. Following the great minds that first drew the links between music and physics-a list including Pythagoras, Kepler, Newton, Einstein, and Rakim-The Jazz of Physics reveals that the ancient poetic idea of the Music of the Spheres,” taken seriously, clarifies confounding issues in physics. The Jazz of Physics will fascinate and inspire anyone interested in the mysteries of our universe, music, and life itself.

User’s Reviews

Editorial Reviews: Review “At first glance, physics and music may not seem the most obvious of bedfellows, but these seemingly disparate fields have much in common. Part-time saxophonist and full-time theoretical cosmologist Stephon Alexander is especially well placed to comment on both and link the two together. Indeed, his book promises to reveal ‘the secret link between music and the structure of the universe.’ Interwoven with solid physics and personal anecdotes, the book does an admirable job of bringing together modern jazz and modern physics.”-Physics World’s Book of the Year 2016, Shortlist”I have long been a serious jazz fan and like to think of myself as a budding armchair cosmologist. So I’ll forever be grateful to musician/physicist Stephon Alexander, who describes the profound ways in which notes and numbers are connected. Alexander chronicles the great thinkers who have explored these links in the past and shares his own journey in the two fields. He’ll help you see how our awe-inspiring universe is on a never-ending, cosmological riff.”-Felix Contreras, NPR, Best Books of 2016″Marvelous.”-New Scientist”Music lovers are at high risk of being inspired by this exploration of the connections between music and physics…. Alexander elegantly charts the progress of science from the ancients through Copernicus and Kepler to Einstein (a piano-player) and beyond, making it clear that what we call genius has a lot to do with convention-challenging courage, a trait shared by each age’s great musicians as well.”-Keith Blanchard, Wall Street Journal”In the most engaging chapters of this book – part memoir, part history of science, part physics popularization and part jazz lesson – Dr. Alexander ventures far out onto the cutting edge of modern cosmology, presenting a compelling case for vibration and resonance being at the heart of the physical structure we find around us, from the smallest particle of matter to the largest clusters of galaxies…. His report on the state of research into the structure and history of the universe – his own academic field – makes for compelling reading, as does his life story.”-Dan Tepfer, New York Times”Music and physics might seem like polar opposites, one having great emotional potency and the other being a cerebral subject of equations, theories and deductions. Both, however, benefit from improvisers – people who stand on the shoulders of giants, taking earlier triumphs and building on them to create something new. For me, analogies like these, which draw parallels between physicists and jazz musicians, are the most fascinating revelations in Stephon Alexander’s book The Jazz of Physics…. The book’s attempt to bring together modern jazz and modern physics strikes me as admirable…. It is an intriguing comparison, and it certainly seems fresher than drawing analogies between classical music and classical physics…. Time to put on some Coltrane and riff some new research ideas?”-Trevor Cox, Physics World”[Alexander] gives an engaging account of his uncertainties and worries as he made his way in the highly competitive world of theoretical physics, seeking to acquire the ‘chops’ needed to deal with the formidable mathematics of his day job along with those needed to solo on the sax after dark…. Mr. Alexander’s rhapsodic excitement is infectious.”-Peter Pesic, Wall Street Journal”[Alexander’s] book, The Jazz of Physics, explores [the] resonance [between science and music] to a depth that far surpasses other works on the same concept.” -New Criterion “Groundbreaking…[Alexander] He illustrates his points with colorful examples, ranging from the Big Bang to the eye of a galactic hurricane.”-Down Beat “Using his own life as the baseline, Alexander, a professor of physics at Brown University, sweetly riffs on deep connections between music and cosmology…. Alexander’s account of his own rise from humble beginnings to produce contributions to both cosmology and jazz is as interesting as the marvelous connections he posits between jazz and physics.”-Publishers Weekly”In this loosely autobiographical meditation, Alexander explores resonances between music and physics in Pythagoras’ ‘music of the spheres,’ Albert Einstein’s love of music, Coltrane’s love of Einstein, and his own ideas as a theoretical physicist and jazz saxophonist. It’s a vast, cosmic theme that includes quantum mechanics, superstring theory, the Big Bang, the evolution of galaxies, and the process of scientific theorizing itself…. Alexander’s enthusiasm for his subject is infectious.”-Kirkus Reviews”This book could just as well be called The Joy of Physics because what leaps out from it is Stephon Alexander’s delight and curiosity about the cosmos, and the deep pleasure he finds in exploring it. True to the jazz he loves so much, Stephon is an intellectual improviser riffing with ideas and equations. It’s a pleasure to witness.” -Brian Eno, artist, composer and producer”The Jazz of Physics is a cornucopia of music, string theory, and cosmology. Stephon takes his reader on a journey through hip hop, jazz, to new ideas in our understanding of the first moment of the big bang. It is a book filled with passion, joy and insight.”-David Spergel, Charles Young Professor of Astronomy & Department Chair, Department of Astrophysical Sciences, Princeton University”A riveting firsthand account of the power of intuitive and unconscious in the process of scientific discovery. Being both top-notch physicist and jazz musician, Stephon Alexander has a unique voice. Listening to him, you will hear the music of the Universe.”-Edward Frenkel, author of Love and Math”Stephon Alexander takes us along on his twinned quest to discover the fundamental principles of physics and of jazz performance and composition. He is a great story teller and he paints vivid portraits of the masters of music and science who guide him on his search, which leads to a revelation of a common pattern and symmetry in the universes created by John Coltrane and Albert Einstein. If you spend one evening of your life contemplating the relationship between art and science, spend it with this book.”-Professor Lee Smolin, founding member of the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics and author of The Trouble with Physics”Is the universe a musical instrument that plays itself? It is according to Stephon Alexander, a string theorist who shares his journey from a crime ridden junior high school to the upper echelons of physics and jazz. Moving fluidly from T dualities to John Cage, he tells how his two worlds blended together like a stereoscopic vision-a sonic cosmos where Einstein and Coltrane naturally meet, and where intuition and improvisation are as important as technique. Whether he’s hanging with Brian Eno or Brian Greene, Alexander never loses sight of the math or the melodies, never condescends to his reader but rather uses his own childlike awe and personal charm to take us into the details of chords and equations. It’s impossible to resist following him as he ‘solos with the equations of D-branes’ on paper napkins in jazz clubs, searching for the eloquent underlying harmonies that brought the universe (and us) into being.”-KC Cole, author of Something Incredibly Wonderful Happens and The Universe and the Teacup: The Mathematics of Truth and Beauty”Music, physics and mathematics have lived in tune since Pythagoras and Kepler, but Prof. Alexander’s book creates a new and powerful resonance, coupling the improvisational world of Jazz to the volatile personality of quantum mechanics, and making the frontiers of cosmology and quantum gravity reverberate like in no other book.”-João Magueijo, Professor of Physics at Imperial College London and author of Faster Than The Speed of Light”In this very creative work Stephon Alexander leads us through his remarkable journey from jazz musician to theoretical physics, from the music of the spheres to string theory.”-Professor Leon N. Cooper, Laureate of the Nobel Prize in Physics”Stephon Alexander has written an entertaining and important book about how science is becoming more like improvised music. Young musicians and scientists will find a deeper way to connect with their work in its pages. There is also a message about scientific progress: It isn’t just about a sterile quest to make a better equation, but also the struggle to build deeper connections between people and between us and the universe at large.”-Jaron Lanier, author of Who Owns the Future? About the Author Stephon Alexander is a professor of physics at Brown University and the winner of the 2013 American Physical Society Edward A. Bouchet Award. He is also a jazz musician and released his first electronic jazz album with Erin Rioux. Alexander lives in Providence, Rhode Island.

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐A unique and personal take on ‘The Meaning Of It All’ physics. Alexander’s use of memoir to… hold on… I met Stephon Alexander in 2005 while doing research for a screenplay; he was at the Stanford Linear Accelerator (SLAC). Since then I wrote a memoir in which Stephon appears. Here’s a bit of it:…I need to explain why I think Stephon Alexander is a special humanbeing, and if you hang in you’ll see how this connects to other things.When we sat down for our interview at Stanford, the first thing I toldStephon was that I’m a dilettante. Stephon stopped me. “That word,” hesaid. “What does it mean?”“Dilettante?”“Yes. What does it mean?”I told him it means that I know just enough about theoretical physics tomake a fool of myself in talking to an actual theoretical physicist.“How do you spell it?”I didn’t really know. I told him there are some “l’s and “t”s but I didn’tknow how many of each, plus there is an “i” somewhere and at least one“e.” Stephon was nodding, taking this in, filing it away somewhere.Then I asked him why he became a theoretical physicist and he saidbecause he was angry at God.Hold on. Let me ask you something. Let’s say that for some reason you’rebeing interviewed because you have expertise at something. Someone, aHollywood screenwriter, say, shows up and you do a formal interview.And let’s say the interviewer starts out by saying something to the effectof how smart you are, but in doing so uses a word you’re unfamiliar with.Here’s the question: Would you stop him and ask what that word means?Neither would I.Why is that? Because our main concern would be how we’re perceived.This would be the case in any situation with a stranger, but especially inan on-the-record interview, and even more especially if the premise of theinterview is that we’re smart.Stephon did not care how he was perceived. Or, rather, he may havecared, but his need to know something, a truth about the world, minorthough it was, was more important.If people – you, say, plus me – worried less about how we’re perceived,we’d worry less about self-image (still another self word), too. Whichmeans we’d be less likely to believe untruths simply because they makeus feel more comfortable about ourselves. Please trust me on something:The belief in untruths is the primary reason why the world is so [screwed] up.In fact, all the reasons why the world is so [screwed] up depend on peoplebelieving untruths. I know that I’m right on this one thing.Stephon Alexander is not one of the reasons why the world is so [screwed] up,which is enough to make him special. In fact, that’s my definition of special,as in special human being. Someone who is not part of the problem of theworld being so fucked-up.And listen. Stephon Alexander knows some secrets of the universe. Trustme on another thing: That Stephon asked me what “dilettante” means andhow you spell it is as much a reason for his knowledge of some secrets of theuniverse as his astounding innate brain power, his intelligence.This angry-at-God thing. Stephon grew up in a poor section of the Bronx,New York. As a child he was confused by all the misery around him. Theconfusion led to anger at God, since he had been told that God createdEverything and Everything must include the misery all around him. Sohe wanted to understand how God could have done this. Stephon, havingbeen blessed with astounding innate intelligence, even as a young personsensed that he would not come to understand about God through studyingreligion or philosophy or anthropology. He was tempted by art, he told me,particularly the art of jazz music. But he decided to dedicate his life to physics,the area of it that looks into first causes. What happened in the beginning.If anyone ever comes close to a real understanding about God it willbe a physicist, someone like Stephon Alexander. It will not be a Popeor an ayatollah or a rabbi or a Buddhist in a monastery or some [screw]ballmother[etc] blabbing away on Sunday morning TV. The reason for thisis simple: Without knowing how things work—what causes what—there isno possibility of knowing anything else. It’s all just words strung togetherand circular reasoning and specious causation and made up stuff and othercrocks of [poop]. All of it.Another thing. That Stephon was tempted to dedicate his life to art, tojazz music, is significant also. In fact, Stephon does dedicate himself to jazzmusic, to playing it on a saxophone, when he’s not looking into first causes.To sum up: In seeking to understand God, Stephon Alexander looks intofirst causes and plays jazz music on a saxophone.I love that.Although he grew up in the United States, Stephon was born in theCaribbean, on an island. I believe that this heritage is part of what makesStephon special. The spirituality of his people. He told me a childhood storyabout his grandmother that gave me the shivers.The island on which Stephon was born is this island, by the way. The littleisland from which I write.#Anyway, it doesn’t surprise me that Stephon has written a fascinating book on physics and Jazz music. Not at all. (That his unquestioning faith in Einstein’s Relativity theories may be misplaced is a separate matter. Those interested should give Electric Universe theory a look, at thunderbolts.info.)

⭐I loved this book. Understanding Physics is tough, and this book does an amazing job of explaining quantum theory, relativity, cosmology, and so much more. And it goes beyond physics to make it feel very real by tying it all to jazz. Stephon Alexander is amazing.

⭐Don’t be afraid of this book. If you love exploring new ideas, you will love this book. If you like being introduced to some incredible people through biographical vignettes, you will love this book. If like a good story of discovery you will love this book.I’ve only finished three chapters, so I can’t do a complete review yet. But here are just some of the things that those first three chapters have done for me.1. They have introduced me to a kid, (the author, Stephon Alexander), whose family is from Trinidad, who grew up in the Bronx with a grandmother who wanted him to become a musician to escape poverty, who went to public schools, who listened to Hip-Hop and Battle Rap and wore dreadlocks, but who is now a theoretical physicist, jazz musician, cosmologist, Ivy-League professor, and someone who knows how to tell a good story.2. I’ve learned how understanding magnetism led to a way to describe neural networks; and how that in turn is leading to new approaches for understanding the structure of our Universe.3. I’ve been introduced to Small’s Jazz Club in New York City. And by going online I have learned about it’s fascinating history, the availability online of most performances there since 2007, and the unique and well thought-out revenue sharing model that supports both the musicians and the club.4. I’ve learned that a parsec is a unit of measure in cosmology that equals approximately 19 trillion miles. That as recently as 1920 there was serious scientific debate about whether there were any galaxies other than our own in the Universe. And that in 1989 Margaret Geller, the daughter of an X-ray crystallographer, along with John Huchra, mapped out other galaxies that extend for 100 million parsecs. Yes, that is 100 million times 19 trillion miles. The mind boggles.If you like this taste of what I’ve experienced you will love the book. I’ll write a full review when I’m done, but I am not going to rush it. It is much too good a story, with far too much thought-provoking substance to hurry through it without savoring.

⭐Dr. Alexander interweaves awesome, mind-bending concepts with funny and engaging personal stories in a book that radically challenges while it satisfies the reader. I am a lifelong fan of both physics and music and find my appreciation for both, and for their creative practitioners, has grown thanks to this book. Moreover I feel my intellect and curiosity for the world’s mysteries has been rekindled. Thank you, Dr. Alexander, for your bold improvisation!

⭐I cannot say enough good things about this book. It was quite amazing to follow Dr. Alexander’s journey to the world of physics through the lens of jazz. I have read review with people complaining about the book being autobiographical or even jumping subjects. That actually is what makes this book so interesting to read. I learned some new aspects of physics, it helped strengthen other elements of physics I had heard about in the past, and it was a pleasure to read about his journey into physics, starting with the first trip to the museum and seeing a display of Albert Einstein.I would highly recommend this book to those with a novice based love of physics, those who love both music and science, and as an amazing way to aspire children, teens, and young adults to reach for their goals in their own unique way. I love that his journey was his and not limited to a one way, boring, pre-charted road.

⭐Well Physics was my best subject at school and music was my evening study. So this book really interested me. It is surprising just how many top flight physicists are also great musicians, Einstein played violin to a high standard, his love was Mozart. From the other angle, John Coltrane was intensely interested in mathematics and physics, which drove his unique take on Jazz.This is the journey this book takes you on, in many ways the personal journey of the author, from growing up in the Broncs with Rasterfarian dreadlocks to meeting his first mentor who’s office had a picture of Einstein on one wall and Coltrane on the other.My biggest surprise was reaching chapter 6, an entire chapter about Brian Eno and cosmology! Brian loaned Stephon his bicycle indefinitely and one of the great things about this book are the stories Stephon tells.You are not going to get away with an easy read on the physics side, though everything is understandable and well explained.I really loved this book and the writing style is very compelling, it hits the right balance between the physics, the music and the stories. I feel Stephon has a lot more to say on the subject, and look forward to any follow ups. The question is who would I recommend this book to? Just about any musician who wants to see a little further into the links with physics and Jazz, and free thinking.

⭐While the ideas behind this book are good, the author doesn’t have the writing skill to pull it off.From such an exciting title, who’d have though that the book could be so dull.And the incessant name-checking becomes very tiresome.

⭐This was a present and the feedback was that the book was excellent. I cannot really rate it myself as I have not read it.

⭐Arrived promptly. Is a gift. Looks interesting.

⭐So richtig überzeugt hat mich das nicht. Dass sich in Musik (ja, Jazz ist Musik….) eine kosmische Ordnung widerspiegelt, ist nicht erst seit heute eine faszinierende Theorie.Ich hätte mir ein tieferes Eindringen in Jazz und Musiktheorie gewünscht – das hätte vermutlich noch viele spannende Parallelen zur Physik ergeben. Stellenweise wirkt der Autor auch etwas unentschlossen und erzählt, wie er beim Jammen oder Abhängen mit Musikern neue Ideen als Physiker bekommt. Aber man hat das Gefühl, es werden zu viele Anekdoten aufgezählt. Der Erzählstil ist auch nicht unbedingt fesselnd. Habe die Lust verloren, es zu Ende zu lesen. Schade.

⭐

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