Its first concert took place in New York City on November 1, 2001, the proceeds of which were donated to families of firefighters from two nearby stations who were killed at the World Trade Center disaster.
[2] The Music of the Spheres Society features a core group of artists - Stephanie Chase (violin), Hsin-Yun Huang (viola), and Jon Manasse (clarinet) - plus guest artists that include soloists, chamber musicians, and principal members of the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra.
Contemporary music performed by the Society has included world premieres and works by Edward Applebaum, John Harbison, Lou Harrison, and Jose Evangelista.
Works by less-known composers - such as Juan Arriaga, Johan Kvandal, Leoš Janáček, Jan Dussek, Zdenek Fibich, and Bohuslav Martinu - are programmed alongside composers such as Brahms, Schubert, Mozart, Ravel, Beethoven, and Prokofiev.
[6] “Music of the Spheres” is a term applied to an idea put forth by the Greek scholar Pythagoras (6th century BCE) and his followers, among them Plato and Kepler, that the proportional ratios used to describe musical intervals also refer to those of the physical universe, including the orbiting motion of planets.