There is something magical in the way Ingrid Carbone unites two seemingly distant worlds: music and mathematics. A professor and researcher of Mathematical Analysis at the University of Calabria and a professional pianist, Ingrid Carbone divides her life between the university classrooms, where she teaches first-year students, and the concert halls, where she performs with her innovative “lecture-concerts”.

Ingrid Carbone has been interviewed on Vanity Fair by Marco Trabucchi on July 5th about her activity as a pianist and mathematician. You can read the full interview (in italian) here>>

A double career that juggles scientific rigor and artistic imagination, between formulas and notes: rigor and certainty on the one hand, imagination and emotion on the other. But how does this dialogue translate concretely into her daily life?

Ingrid Carbone, rhythm as arithmetic

The music-mathematics pairing is not a contradiction at all, on the contrary: «At the base of music there is rhythm, and rhythm is pure elementary arithmetic», explains Carbone with the naturalness of someone who has found the squaring of the circle. «It is no coincidence that many children, especially those introduced to music at home, throw in the towel when faced with the difficulty of solfeggio, which is a bit like the anatomy exam for medical students: those who can stand it, advance». Solfeggio, so feared, in fact requires a certain familiarity with mathematics, even if you don’t need to be a genius with numbers: «A familiarity with elementary arithmetic is enough, the kind you learn in elementary school or the first years of middle school», specifies the mathematician-pianist.

The scientific method as an added value

For Carbone, mathematics is the essential foundation for understanding rhythm and, consequently, for progressing in musical studies: «Without rigorous study and a complete understanding of rhythm, you cannot move forward». Not only that: «My mathematical training profoundly influences the way I study a piece of music, especially today, when a performance becomes a record production and requires much more in-depth analysis». And yet, this relationship has not always been so linear: «Until recently, I saw mathematics as a contrast to music, almost as a burden, a limit to my artistic growth». Then came the epiphany: «I realized that the scientific method that I learned at university and through my academic activity is a fundamental added value for my musical studies».