Math-Music Whiz Invited to International Symposium
A UC junior majoring in both math and musical composition has been invited to make a keynote address on his computerized compositions at an international symposium of mathematicians meeting in London. The undergraduate will be on the same program as John Nash, whose life was dramatized by the movie, "A Beautiful Mind."
Carl McTague, a UC junior majoring in both mathematics and music composition, will present a keynote address to the 5th International Mathematica Symposium this July at the Imperial College London. He will be in good company. Other keynote speakers at the conference include Nobel laureate John Nash, whose life was dramatized in the film “Beautiful Mind,” and Bruno Buchberger, who has an algorithm named after him.
| Carl McTague |
McTague received an invitation to speak at the international conference via an e-mail addressed to Professor McTague – a pretty flattering salutation for an undergraduate. Such an invitation to an undergraduate math major at UC is so uncommon that mathematical sciences department head Timothy Hodges says “It’s never happened in the 20 years I’ve been here. This student is truly exceptional.”
His London presentation will take place at 4 p.m. Monday, July 7, on the South Kensington campus of Imperial College London. On the UC campus, he will give a preliminary view of the talk at 4 p.m. Thursday, June 5, in Room 309, Braunstein Hall.
The Thursday talk represents the second colloquium presented by McTague to UC students and faculty. According to Joe Fisher, professor of mathematical sciences at UC, McTague is the first UC math undergraduate in the 25 years Fisher has taught here to present a colloquium to teachers and peers.
McTague’s presentation will focus on the creative musical compositions he has developed using mathematical structures and computations. Some people call this field algorithmic composition, but McTague views his work as different and superior to most music using algorithmic composition. “It’s kind of controversial,” he says, “because a lot of people don’t think something should be called music unless it was created in a very specific way – note for note by hand on staff paper, for instance.”
Comparing his work to that of John Cage, who is noted for innovative compositions such as one in which a performer turns on a radio and changes channels, he notes: “Mine is much less radical than his. With mine, you are listening to something slightly odd that is composed in an extremely unconventional way, but it’s the same piece every time you hear it. With his, pieces can sound different each time.”
McTague’s web site features a variety of his compositions. Among them is “(ii-V-I) to the power of seven.” It uses a common progression used in a lot of music – including almost everything Bach wrote. In McTague’s score, the music gets faster and faster, building and accelerating as the progression is embedded within itself seven times, resulting in a self-similar progression 2,187 chords long. In another piece, his composition simulates a system of particles moving through space.
McTague, a 1999 Walnut Hills High School graduate and Hyde Park resident, came to UC in the dual admissions program that admitted him both as an undergraduate and as a medical school student. He originally majored in engineering, but has now decided to focus on the double major of composition and math. The 23-year-old is still leaving the door open to the possibility of becoming an MD.
Also an accomplished fiddler interested in the fiddle and Uillean piping traditions of Ireland's northwestern counties, he plans to travel to Ireland after his London presentation. After June 17, he will be returning to his summer research work in dynamical systems, computation and information theory with physicist Jim Crutchfield at the Santa Fe Institute.
McTague has won several awards while at UC including the prestigious Barry M. Goldwater scholarship, the first Richard E. Greenholz Scholarship offered by the McMicken College of Arts and Sciences and the mathematics department's highest honor for undergraduates, the Jeanne Gulden Scholarship, as well as their Harry S. Kieval and Harris Hancock awards.
The following are links to some of Carl's music.
6 Integers January 2000
(program notes) (original mp3 ~6.9 MB) (reorchestrated mp3 ~6.5 MB)
The Road to Lisdoonvarna, The Holly Bush (Reels, Trad.) Recorded December 2002
(ogg ~4.2 MB)(mp3 ~4.5 MB)
The Southwest Wind, The Young Tom Ennis, Fraher's Jig. (Jigs, Trad.) Recorded December 2002
(ogg ~5.6 MB)(mp3 ~5.0 MB)
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