From 1958 to 1972, Leonard Bernstein presented a series of educational programs on the nature of music dubbed Young People’s Concerts. The very last one televised on March 26, 1972 was the very first one that I watched, a presentation of Gustav Holst’s The Planets. Most of the series is now available on YouTube, and among the programs are What is Orchestration, What is Classical Music, and What is a Melody? While I can appreciate music, the process of creating music always seemed a bit of a mystery to me. Bernstein is excellent in demystifying that process for this no longer quite so young person. It’s not an exaggeration to say Bernstein did for music what Carl Sagan or Neil deGrasse Tyson did for astronomy.
In 1967, Bernstein hosted a special called Inside Pop – The Rock Revolution. While he called rock 95% trash, Bernstein said the new music and its message should be listened to and taken seriously. By 1972, Bernstein seemed a bit cynical on that, at least the embrace of astrology over science that started during that era. Holst’s The Planets was based on astrology and Bernstein went through great pains to distinguish that from science. Any astronomy teacher who receives a paper with the class title Astrology 101 can relate. Nonetheless, we cannot control the beliefs a student has coming into a class, but we can use that to bridge the gap into a scientific understanding of the universe.
Bernstein starts things off with a rousing version of Mars – Bringer of War. Mars was the Roman god of war and the planet was given that designation as a result of its blood-red appearance. The reddish hue of the Martian surface can be seen with the naked eye when Mars approaches opposition. This occurs when Mars and the Sun are on opposite sides of Earth and is when Mars is closest. Opposition of Mars happens every 26 months and the next is July 27, 2018. These events also provide the optimal launch window to the red planet. Oxidation of iron in the Martian dust that creates the red color, oxidation being a fancy word for rusting. The same process occurs in parts of Oklahoma which has red soil.
The most famous association of Mars with war was H.G. Wells’ War of the Worlds. We now know that intelligent life does not exist on Mars. As late as the 1950’s, it was still thought that vegetation could survive on Mars. The Mariner missions of the 1960’s disproved that. However, the space age has proven oceans once existed on Mars and the subsurface still has quite a bit of water. It is possible for microbial life to thrive in the Martian subsurface. Perhaps ironic, as it was Earth’s microbes that did in the invading Martians in War of the Worlds. It is food for thought at NASA’s Planetary Protection office charged with preventing cross contamination between Earth and Mars.
Bernstein concludes that Mars – The Bringer of War is an ugly piece of music and that is appropriate as what is uglier than war? Unspoken was the Vietnam War still casting an ugly shadow over America in 1972. Six years later, John Williams would use this piece as an inspiration for his Star Wars score. From politics to pop culture, perhaps an indication of America’s beginning stages of healing during that period.
Next up is Venus – Bringer of Peace. Bernstein notes Venus was actually a god of love, but astrologers use Venus to symbolize peace. Venus is the brightest of all the planets from our vantage point on Earth. Venus is anything but peaceful. The atmosphere is 96% carbon dioxide and a runaway greenhouse effect heats the surface enough to melt lead. The atmosphere is so thick that pressure is 90 times greater than Earth’s. NASA has never tried to land on Venus, but the Soviet Venera program made 10 landings between 1970 and 1981. The landers lasted from 23 minutes to two hours before being overwhelmed by the harsh conditions.
The brightness of Venus that seems so peaceful to us on Earth is caused by the reflection of light from sulfuric acid clouds. Some 70% of sunlight that hits Venus is reflected back into space. This compares to 30% for Earth. As Venus occupies an orbit inside Earth’s, it does not appear to stray too far from the Sun, becoming visible just after sunset or just before sunrise. This is even more so for Mercury.
Bernstein introduces Mercury – The Winged Messenger by noting how Holst employs double keys and rhythms as Mercury is perceived as a double-dealing, tricky sort. It only takes Mercury 88 days to orbit the Sun and as it oscillates from one side of the Sun to the other, it changes from morning object, hidden by the Sun, to evening object in less than 2 months. Mercury has some other tricks up its sleeve, such as ice in permanently shadowed polar craters. Mercury lacks an atmosphere so heat is not distributed from sunlight to dark areas allowing ice to form in the closest planet to the Sun.
Then comes Jupiter – Bringer of Jollity. This is the most famous piece in the suite. While I do not think of Jupiter as jolly, it can be described as boisterous. Jupiter is a source of radio emissions that are detected with ham radios on Earth. Jupiter’s intense magnetic field accelerates charged particles creating the radio emissions. Jupiter’s moon Io is flexed by the giant planet’s gravity, making it the most volcanic body in the Solar System, so much so, its surface resembles a pizza. As Io ejects this material into space, it becomes ionized and is fed into Jupiter’s magnetic field providing a source for radio emissions.
Due to time constraints, Bernstein elected to skip the pieces on Saturn and Neptune which he described as slow and ponderous. As this program was geared for children, I suspect even then, these pieces would have had trouble keeping the attention of the audience. After Uranus – The Magician, (no jokes made on the pronunciation, this was at the Lincoln Center), Bernstein wrapped things up with an improvised piece called Pluto – The Unpredictable. Holst composed The Planets before Pluto was discovered. And Pluto did turn out to be unpredictable, so much so that it is no longer considered a planet. Rather, it was the first Kuiper Belt object discovered. It was not until the 1990’s that others would be detected. So, no need to fret about missing Pluto in this musical set.
I don’t frown upon someone who has an emotional reaction when gazing at the night sky. We’re not Vulcans. The planets and stars inspire more than just science. It can inspire music and art among other things including, shudder, astrology. As far as the latter goes, one hopes to transition a student from a belief in superstition to science, but be aware, that usually does not occur overnight. That aside, Holst’s The Planets still presents a nifty opportunity for an interdisciplinary take on the Solar System as it did for me on that sunny, cold early Spring Sunday afternoon 46 years ago.
*Image atop post – Leonard Bernstein leads the New York Philharmonic in its rendition of Jupiter – Bringer of Jollity.