The Milan Symphony Orchestra celebrates Earth Day with climate change in music

Earth Day, the world day for protecting the planet, falls on April 22nd and the Milan Symphony Orchestra celebrates it in music. In fact, for the Musica & Scienza event, it will take place on Saturday 20 April at 6pm Climate change, an event whose protagonist is the climatologist Luca Mercalli engaged in a passionate interdisciplinary dialogue with the orchestra conducted by Ruben Jais. At the center of this appointment we find The [uncertain] Four Seasons, one of the most interesting musical projects linked to the climate issue, an algorithmic recomposition of The Four Seasons of Vivaldideveloped by composers, musicians, climate scientists and computer scientists using geospatial climate predictions for 2050.

At the start of Youth and Public Empowerment Day at COP26 on 5 November 2021, The [uncertain] Four Seasons published the performances of 14 orchestras from six continents, half of which were youth orchestras, the latter being an emblematic fact that attests to the fact that young people are at the forefront of the climate movement. The [Uncertain] Four Seasons is an initiative by AKQA, a leading digital communications and design agency, and Jung von Matt, composer Hugh Crosthwaite, the Sydney Symphony Orchestra and the Monash Climate Change Communications Research Hub.

Using a sophisticated algorithm, geospatial variations from IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) modeling were mapped to the original score, allowing different versions to be generated for specific locations. From Amsterdam to Seoul, from Caracas to Bremen, the project has “generated” different music depending on the characteristics of the place in which it was performed, in a kaleidoscope of sound that takes on different connotations from time to time. The resulting music is a distortion of the landscape that inspired Vivaldi. In some variations, the birds remain silent. In others, storms are more intense or rivers stop flowing. In all variants, the changes are clear and irrefutable. A musical message that reminds us that if we don’t act now, the landscape of 2050 will change radically from what we know and rely on.

This is the second event that the Milan Symphony has dedicated to Earth Day, after the one on April 6th with Great Earth. Musical journey into biodiversity, the world premiere of the Banda Osiris alongside Telmo Pievani, evolutionist and scientific narrator who holds the first Italian chair of Philosophy of Biological Sciences at the Department of Biology of the University of Padua. An event that recorded unanimous appreciation from the older and younger audiences.

«With the symphonic initiatives in April, dedicated to the month of Earth Day», explains Ambra Redaelli, president of the Milan Symphony Orchestra, «we want to underline the Foundation’s sensitivity towards issues related to the environment, a reflection of the commitment of the Milan Symphony Orchestra in this sense, which also and above all translates into a series of behaviors that are important to adopt in everyday life. Example above all: the installation of photovoltaic panels on the roof of the Milan Auditorium, 114 photovoltaic panels which allow us to self-produce two-thirds of the energy needs of our theatre. But there is also the issue of raising awareness towards abandoning the use of plastic, with the installation of water dispensers in all our spaces. Added to all this is programming that aims to share reflections related to biodiversity and climate change with the public, through music.”