Fibonacci in popular music

(Ya Had to Be A) Big Shot

eddiecaps — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 15:17:32 +0000

Track 2 is Big Shot. The song is 3:35 in length and contains a golden section from 2:08 to 2:20. It is short but it’s pure gold. Haha.

Anyway, the midpoint of the GS is 2:14

3:35/2:14 = 1.604

This is sufficiently close to Fibonacci to constitute another hit. So far both tracks on V2 have been close enough in my book to have significance.

More to come!

Billy Joel GHV2!

eddiecaps — Thu, 29 Mar 2007 15:08:49 +0000

The first track is “My Life”. This a great song and starts the volume off wonderfully. The song is 3:43 in length. At 2:16 a dramatic verse of the song, which I believe to be the climax, begins.

3:43/2:16 = 1.64

This is close to fibonacci, not perfect, but close. So far, so good though, I think. I am not at my home comp right now, but I intend to go back and reexamine whether the song has a golden section. However, I do know that it is not at a time that corresponds to fibonacci.

She’s Always a Woman

eddiecaps — Sat, 24 Mar 2007 17:17:17 +0000

This is the final track on the Greatest Hits Volume 1. The song is 3:18 in length and the climax, in my opinion, occurs at 2:03.

3:18/2:03 = 1.61

This is very close to Fibonacci and rounds out the Volume on a high note!

I will have to check to be sure but I believe 8 or 9 out of the 11 tracks were within a close range of Fibonacci! This is awesome!

Don’t Get Around Much Anymore

selaha — Wed, 21 Mar 2007 16:10:47 +0000

The next song on the list is “Don’t Get Around Much Anymore.” First, I checked the Tony Bennett version and than of course, the Rod one.

Tony’s version is actually longer than Rods, which is a first for the Rod cover songs. It clocks in at 196 seconds with a dramatic instrumental climax from 130-152 seconds. Suprisingly, even though the climax is very long, it does not conform to the golden section.

The Rod version is a little bit different. it clocks in at 168 seconds and has an instrumental climax from 78-116 seconds. This range does have the golden section in it, with 104 being the exact point. (168/104=1.615). Rod works his magic, again! It is crazy how Rod’s version of all of these classics conform to the golden section.

Only the Good Die Young!

eddiecaps — Wed, 21 Mar 2007 03:59:15 +0000

This is one of Billy’s greatest ever…and it’s an exciting one to research because it is 3:53 in length, which is 233 seconds…a Fibonacci Sequence number! Let’s start with the golden section. It begins at 2:26..

3:53/2:26 = 1.596

This, again, is close enough to be a hit in my book. I am so impressed by Billy; it’s crazy how many of this album’s songs have fit the sequence: 8 out of 10 i believe.

Now, since the song is 233 seconds, I will analyze the song at the points where the other sequence numbers occur.

The song picks up pace at 13 seconds in. 55 seconds marks the beginning of what I think is the 2nd verse of the song. At 89 seconds Billy screams DIIIIIE! as he is midway through singing, “Only the good DIIIIE young”.

Those are the only connections I saw but I think they are very noteworthy in our findings..

As I was researching this song online, I found an interesting blog post that rose questions about the morality of the lyrics of the song…check it out! http://qandablog.typepad.com/questions_and_answers/2005/05/only_the_good_d.html

Movin’ Out

eddiecaps — Wed, 21 Mar 2007 03:49:13 +0000

Hey all, I’m home for spring break right now so I am pretty happy about that haha. I hope you guys had a good trip and are ready to get back to the grind and whatnot.

Anyway, back to business, more Billy GHV1.

Movin’ out is a great song that is 3:28 in length. I found the song to lack a golden section but the climax(in my opinion) is at 2:07 when Billy says, “you should never argue with a crazy mind mind mind…”

3:28/2:07 = 1.637

This is pretty close to Fibonacci and I classify this song as another “hit” in our quest.

I’m In The Mood For Love

selaha — Sat, 17 Mar 2007 19:29:10 +0000

I couldn’t locate the first song off the second Great American Song Book, so I decided to start with the second, “I’m In The Mood For Love.” Originally sung by Sinatra and covered by Rod for the album.

The Sinatra version is 122 seconds long (no fibonacci relation). It does not really have any climax in the song so I could not even test it for golden section purposes.

The Rod version is more interesting. It is 187 seconds long with a long, drawn out instrumental climax ranging from 102 seconds all the way until 124 seconds. Because of this, the golden section does fit somewhere in the middle of the climax .

187/102 = 1.83 and 187/124 = 1.50….187/116 = 1.612.

so, the frank version does not conform to anything but the rod version conforms to the golden section…rod keeps it going!

Back from Spring Break

selaha — Fri, 16 Mar 2007 21:51:42 +0000

we’re all back from fun in the sun on spring break and ready to continue our quest to find connections between popular music and fibonacci numbers. As you can see, we switched blogging programs because we can do more here on wordpress. We’re currently working on a list of all the fibonacci songs that we found and some stats on them.

Lets get back to the songs…Ed, you continue working on Billy Joel, Joe and I will start on the 2nd version of Rod Stewart’s Great American Song Book. Here are the songs we will be working with:

1. Time After Time

2. I’m In The Mood For Love

3. Don’t Get Around Much Anymore

4. Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered

5. Till There Was You

6. Until The Real Thing Comes Along

7. Where Or When

8. Smile

9. My Heart Stood Still

10. Someone To Watch Over Me

11. As Time Goes By

12. I Only Have Eyes For You

13. Crazy She Calls Me

14. Our Love Is Here To Stay

Just the Way You Are

eddiecaps — Thu, 15 Mar 2007 13:55:07 +0000

Track 8 off of Greatest Hits Vol. 1 is a beautiful song that I’ve always loved. It is 3:36 in length

The golden section lasts from 2:06 to 2:32, which leaves a midpoint of 2:19

3:36/2:19 = 1.553

This is slightly off from Fibonacci but in the range of the other 2 songs that missed as well, within, .06 ish of the target.

I have faith that the end of this album will serve us well!

Greetings WordPress! More from Billy Joel!

eddiecaps — Sat, 10 Mar 2007 01:27:22 +0000

I’m up and ready to post! Next on Greatest Hits Volume I is one of my personal favorite songs… Scenes from an Italian Restaurant.

The song is 7:38 seconds in length and the golden section occurs from 4:30 to 4:56.

Taking the midpoint of the golden section gives us 4:43.

7:38/4:43 = 1.618!Exactly Fibonacci’s number!

I have had tremendous success with Billy Joel so far and GHV1. That’s 5 out of 7 songs now that closely conform and 2 that are just a tad out of the range. There is definitely something going on with Mr. Joel!