332 | Dmitri Tymoczko on the Mathematics Behind Music

<p>Music is math that you can dance to. The fact that certain notes sound good when played together, or in succession, is related to the mathematical properties of the frequencies to which they correspond, an idea that goes back as far as Pythagoras himself. These days we have a much more intricate understanding of these relationships and how to manipulate them. I talk to composer and music theorist Dmitri Tymoczko about how different musical scales are constructed and the math underlying what sounds good.</p> <p>Blog post with transcript: <a href="https://www.preposterousuniverse.com/podcast/2025/10/20/332-dmitri-tymoczko-on-the-mathematics-behind-music/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">https://www.preposterousuniverse.com/podcast/2025/10/20/332-dmitri-tymoczko-on-the-mathematics-behind-music/</a></p> <p>S<em>upport Mindscape on </em><a href="https://www.patreon.com/seanmcarroll" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><em>Patreon</em></a><em>.</em></p> <p>Dmitri Tymoczko received a Ph.D. in music composition from the University of California, Berkeley. He is currently a professor of music at Princeton University as well as a composer and performer. He has been the recipient of Rhodes and Guggenheim fellowships. As a composer, his works have been performed by multiple groups, and recorded on several albums.</p> <ul> <li><a href="https://dmitri.mycpanel.princeton.edu/index.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Personal web site</a></li> <li><a href="https://music.princeton.edu/people/dmitri-tymoczko" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Princeton web page</a></li> <li><a href="https://www.madmusicalscience.com/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Mad Musical Science</a></li> <li>Spiral diagrams: <a href="https://www.madmusicalscience.com/cs.html?chord=C,E,G&amp;scale=12" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">rock music</a>, <a href="https://www.madmusicalscience.com/cs.html?chord=C,E&amp;scale=7" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">classical music</a></li> <li><a href="https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&amp;as_sdt=0%2C21&amp;q=dmitri+tymoczko&amp;btnG=&amp;oq=dmitri+tym" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Google Scholar publications</a></li> <li><a href="https://www.amazon.com/stores/Dmitri-Tymoczko/author/B0046CHXOO" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Amazon author page</a></li> <li><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dmitri_Tymoczko" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Wikipedia</a></li> <li>William Sethares's <a href="https://sethares.engr.wisc.edu/ttss.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><em>Tuning Timbre Spectrum Scale</em></a></li> </ul> <p><br /></p>