It's Getting Hot Out Here! (2023)

Incorporating sonification of Washington, D.C. climate data from 1871–2022

for flute, violin, and cello

Duration: 4:30

Composed for and recorded by members of Balance Campaign.

Note:

The driving concept in It’s Getting Hot Out Here! is the use of climate data (namely, temperature averages) from a specific, local location to demonstrate evidence of a significant rise in temperatures over the last 152 years. The data came from the earliest to most recent temperature logs of the National Weather Service, covering the years 1871–2022 (the NWS was founded in 1870). Washington, D.C. was chosen as the climate data location for a few reasons: it is a local city in relation to the composer, the location of the first event involving the work (at the Catholic University of America), a good survey location at the midpoint of the East Coast, as well as the capital of the country, where important policies affecting our climate are made. The one-, five-, and ten-year temperature averages, as well as the total range of the averages over the given timespan are translated into pitch through numerous systems and formulas, as noted in the score and below.

The introduction and ending are meant to set the tone and retain the idea of rising temperatures in motion through the use of pizzicato glissandos, rising dynamics, and an accelerating scalar figure shooting up from a low to a high register in the flute. Starting in m. 10: the annual average temperatures represent the notes of a figure starting in the cello and passed between it and the flute, the range for which is transposed up by the rise in ten-year average temperatures every four measures; the five-year average temperatures determine the starting notes of a scalar figure starting in the flute and passed between it and the cello; the total range of annual average temperatures from 1871–2022 translates to the total range covered by the slowly rising drone-like violin part. As this section (mm. 10–74) progresses, there appear brief, scattered interruptions, anomalies in the systems, meant to heighten the tension as their pervasiveness gradually increases. The following section (mm. 76–95) uses the ten-year average temperatures to determine the notes of a figure that is shared in harmony by the trio members. The interval between the instruments in the first iteration of this figure are a perfect fifth apart, the second iteration sees them a perfect fourth apart, the third iteration a minor third apart, and the last iteration a minor second apart. The ever tightening harmony, as well as the increasing rhythmic speed, serves to heighten the intensity of this briefer depiction of the data.