The Sound of 2013

Writer Todd Reubold
@treubold Media and communications professional

Tweet Facebook Share on Google+ Linkedin

We are glad to share Ensia articles free of charge under the terms of Creative Commons’ Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported license. At the beginning of your post, please attribute the writer and Ensia as the original source and link to the Ensia article.

You must use the “Get Article” link below and use the copied text for your repost. Stories may not be edited without permission from Ensia. Please send an email to contact@ensia.com with a link to the republished story on your site once posted.

Images and other visuals are not included in this license. For specific questions related to visuals, please contact David Doody. For other inquiries, email contact@ensia.com.

The post is now in your clipboard. You can paste it directly into the WYSIWYG editor of your site.

April 4, 2014 — Last June, University of Minnesota geography student Daniel Crawford starred in the video for “A Song of Our Warming Planet” — a composition that expressed 130 years of global temperature records as notes on the cello. Since then the video has received over 140,000 views in nearly every corner of the world.

Now Crawford has produced a version of the composition for guitar in tablature format that’s available for download here. He’s also added a new note to signify the Earth’s average annual temperature for the year 2013.

The latest data from NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies showed 2013 was tied for the seventh warmest year since 1880. Following Dan’s scheme to convert temperature data to a musical score, 2013’s temperature of 0.6 degrees warmer than the mid-20th century baseline works out to an A sharp.

Show your support for nonprofit journalism!

Ensia shares solutions-focused stories free of charge through our online magazine and partner media. That means audiences around the world have ready access to stories that can — and do — help them shape a better future. If you value our work, please show your support today.

Yes, I'll support Ensia!

The Sound of 2013

You care about environmental issues. So do we!

You're in! Watch your email soon for stories that build awareness and understanding of urgent environmental problems — and promising solutions to those problems.