Tuesday Video: This is what climate change sounds like

Hot enough for ya? Maybe the weather conjures up a certain DJ Jazzy Jeff and Fresh Prince classic but University of Minnesota student/cellist Daniel Crawford created a musical way to demonstrate the warming trend in historical temperature data.

Crawford converted the average global temperature for each year to a note by using a higher pitch for hotter weather.

Just a little sumthin to break the monotony, as Fresh Prince would say.

He is basically playing data - with notes going up and down to indicate normal variation until the pitch gets gets higher and the average is getting higher as well. It’s not really catchy but I’ve never heard science communicated in such a way.

Nerd out from Ensia : Crawford based his composition on surface temperature data from NASA’s Goddard Institute of Space Studies. The temperature data were mapped over a range of three octaves, with the coldest year on record (–0.47 °C in 1909) set to the lowest note on the cello (open C). Each ascending halftone is equal to roughly 0.03°C of planetary warming.

In Crawford’s composition, each note represents a year, ordered from 1880 to 2012. The pitch reflects the average temperature of the planet relative to the 1951–80 base line. Low notes represent relatively cool years, while high notes signify relatively warm ones.

The result is a haunting sequence that traces the warming of our planet year by year since the late 19th century. During a run of cold years between the late 1800s and early 20th century, the cello is pushed towards the lower limit of its range. The piece moves into the mid-register to track the modest warming that occurred during the 1940s. As the sequence approaches the present, the cello reaches higher and higher notes, reflecting the string of warm years in the 1990s and 2000s.

Read the rest HERE .