The European Space Agency this weekend (THIS) will make a symbolic cultural gesture - broadcast the famous waltz of Johann Strauss the Younger for the first time “On the beautiful blue Danube” into outer space.
Music, which has long been associated with space thanks to the iconic film “2001: A space odyssey” (1968), will be part of the anniversary events for the 50th anniversary of the establishment of ESA and the 200th anniversary of the birth of the Austrian composer.
A live performance of the piece by the Vienna Symphony Orchestra will take place on Saturday and will be streamed online. In parallel, ESA will transmit an audio signal in the form of an electromagnetic wave using a 35-meter antenna in Spain, which is normally used to accompany ESA missions to Mars, The Sun and deep space.
The signal will be sent in the direction of the Voyager probe 1, who left the solar system in 2012 year. Thanks to the speed of light, radio waves with music “catch up” probe only for 23 years, although it was launched back in 1977 year.
This gesture is designed to compensate for the historical gap: Strauss's waltz did not make it to the famous Voyager Golden Disc - a selection from 27 musical works, which NASA sent with the mission for potential contact with other civilizations. Austrian Vienna, as a center of classical music, acted as ESA's partner in this initiative.
ESA emphasizes, that communication technologies, usually oriented towards scientific data, may also serve as a means of transmitting human art beyond Earth.
This is not the first case, when music is broadcast into space: in 2008 year NASA sent a song “Across the Universe” by The Beatles, a u 2023 year - track “The Rain” Missy Elliott to Venus.