Pink Floyd's astronomical domains:
A story that confirms the connection!
That there are real connections between Pink Floyd's music and astronomy is hard to deny. Since its inception, Pink Floyd's music has always had a tremendous influence due to the adventure of the human race in its process of knowledge and understanding of the Universe, expressed through astronomy. In each album there are dozens of references, some very obvious and others that go almost unnoticed. What I will relate to you next belongs to the first type of references that, without a doubt, strongly shook my relationship with the music of Pink Floyd.
In 1994 I was hired as staff observer on the SCMT 1.2m radio telescope, under an agreement between the Max Plank Institute (Germany) and the astronomy department of the University of Chile. After months of working in a multinational team, we aimed at making observations to map large scale structures in the Milky Way plane. And I was very privileged to be a part of that team !!!
The project, of very long duration, produced as a final result scientific publications and, most importantly, helped astronomers to complete a map of the molecular clouds in the Milky Way. From these lines I cannot thank enough to the people that gave me the opportunity to be involved in such an amazing job and, to some extent, to open the window to make my dreams come true.
To some extent, that dome became the epicenter of my life. Over the course of those months my life developed around this project. Obviously, the observations were musicalized with Pink Floyd. My friends from the Cerro Tololo said that the dome of the SCMT 1.2m did not work if Pink Floyd did not set the scene for the observations … And they were absolutely in the right!
In the meantime, like all Pink Floyd fans around the world, I was more than desperate as time passed and, since the last officially released album, "A Momentary Lapse of Reason" in 1987, there had been no signs of Pink Floyd's life. Meanwhile, I took advantage of the nights and, while I was observing with the radio telescope, it gave me time to take pictures of the Cerro Tololo observatory. In one of them, three domes illuminated by the light of the full moon became one of my favorites. Exactly the dome on the left was the dome of the SCMT 1.2m
Until the big day came... Through the Echoes mailing list I found out about the long awaited announcement: Pink Floyd announced a new studio album named "The Division Bell", which would include a world tour !!! The wait was over. The first thing I did when I traveled to Santiago was to reserve the CD. After a few days of tense waiting, the long-awaited album arrived at the store and I ran like a demon, with only one goal: to have the CD in my hands. Once I paid for the CD, I ran to my apartment, opened it immediately, and like any fan who has a long-awaited CD, it didn't take long for me to relax and start the amazing journey of listening by first time “The Division Bell”. At that moment I realized what could not be real but it was: The opening track, named "Cluster One" featuring a sort of astronomical reference; Cluster: Cumulus; astronomical term that refers to a group of stars or galaxies.
But that name reference was just the beginning and went far beyond since the artwork of “Cluster one” featured nothing less than the photograph of my own workplace: The Inter-American Observatory of Cerro Tololo. Not everyday you’ll get to see your work- place in a Pink Floyd artwork.
What happened to me back in1994 has left a deep mark on my way of understanding music and, above all, how close it can get to you. I have interpreted all this with the passing of time as a true culmination of a process that, naturally, has marked my life towards the astronomical domains of Pink Floyd.
All the best, clear skies and shine on