Elements are music to chemist's ears
11 Jul 2008 by Evoluted New Media
Here at Lab News we like to think we are pretty up on current scientific debate, and if there was ever a burning question for our times it must be “what chemical elements are most cited in music?” No? Just us and a Spanish chemist then.
Here at Lab News we like to think we are pretty up on current scientific debate, and if there was ever a burning question for our times it must be “what chemical elements are most cited in music?” No? Just us and a Spanish chemist then.
According to a study carried out by Santiago Álvarez, professor at the School of Chemistry of the University of Barcelona, the four chemical elements cited most often in musical songs and compositions are, in this order, silver, gold, tin and oxygen, followed by copper and iron.
“The idea behind this arose during the events held in 2007 to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the death of Mendeléiev, the Russian chemist who created the periodic table of elements,” said Álvarez. He concluded that an analysis of song titles and group names shows that: “a non-negligible portion of scientific terminology has already been incorporated into popular tradition, although this is often used superficially.”
To quantify the presence of these elements in the music market, Álvarez analysed the English and Spanish names of each element in a musical cyber store. In general, with the exception of oxygen, the elements that appear most frequently in musical compositions are the metals seen most often over the history of humanity and daily life, says Álvarez.
“Silver and gold share the pedestal of popular imagination. Both appear in songs not only because they are components of a large variety of objects, but also because they are the symbol of wealth, luxury and power.”
The chemical element often related to love is oxygen. So, for example The Spice Girls sing about a love that is “as essential as oxygen” in their song Oxygen, a name that is also used by the Christian music group Ávalon as the title for one of its albums.
The final aim of the study published in the New Journal of Chemistry, was not so much a comprehensive statistical analysis but rather to build bridges between science and music, says Álvarez.
Perhaps he should have gone further and tailored a few well known tracks for the sake of his quest. May we suggest Sweet home Aluminium, or perhaps Hotel californium. Although we concede that trying to shoehorn ununquadium into popular culture maybe a bridge too far.
