How did you come up with the idea to use information picked up by radio telescopes as the basis for music?

Dr. Terenzi: Everything started during my doctoral research at the University of California, San Diego, Computer Audio Research Laboratory, where by applying sound synthesis language to radio astronomical data I came up with a technique called Acoustic Astronomy. This experiment focused on the radio emission collected via radio telescopes from a galaxy 180 million light years away and allowed me to listen to galactic radio waves. The purpose of this first experiment was to allow me to explore if sound can be useful for astronomical investigations - to see if sound can reflect chemical, physical and dynamical properties of celestial objects. After the straight scientific research I started to play and compose music with the galactic and other space sounds. But the idea started with my investigations into audification of celestial data.

Was combining music/entertainment with science/education always a goal of yours, or is it just the product of your interests?

Dr. Terenzi: It was the product of desperation after 20 years of boring professors, teaching me science in a boring way. You look around and you see only men - no female role models. You are also in a country like Italy much dominated by men and you are a teenager trying to decide what to do with your life. So you turn to movies or TV to look for a role model, and what you see is the work of George Lucas or Steven Speilberg. You hope to find some female role model, maybe someone intelligent, sensual, fun, artistic, musical but yet again you face movies where the main characters are always men. So you can understand how easy it is to get frustrated, or much better super-angry. That's why I invented a new way of being. A new way of being both as a musician doing radio-astronomical music and as an astrophysicist doing music. So of course it is a goal, but it is a way of being more than a goal. I cannot separate that from who I am.