Home » Member Page
Daniel Mège
Almost became a jazz musician, inadvertently ended up as a planetary scientist.
About Me
I am a planetary scientist working on deformation and volcanism of solid planets, covering only a fraction of Sun Ra's planetary procession (for instance, Saturn is gaseous). While I was an undergrad in Strasbourg, France, I played jazz piano two to three times per week during two years, reaching over 400 one-hour sets. Then I moved to science.
I obtained a PhD in Geophysics and Geodynamics at Paris-Sud University in Orsay. Since then, I have been wandering wherever funds and inspiration have taken me: the University of Nevada in Reno, the German Aerospace Centre in Berlin, NASA's regional planetary image facility in Orsay, the University of Clermont-Ferrand, Pierre and Marie Curie University in Paris, the University of Nantes, Addis Ababa University, the Institute of Geological Sciences of the Polish Academy of Sciences, the Space Research Centre of the Polish Academy of Sciences, the Institut de Physique du Globe in Paris, the International Research School of Planetary Sciences in Pescara, and currently the Physics Institute at University of Bern.
I enjoy my work a lot, but have never really given up on the idea of doing things in music. I have found it surprising how much keeping an open mind opens up unforeseen directions. For instance, in the last several years I have been more and more involved in the interpretation of data being collected by the Trace Gas Orbiter spacecraft around Mars.
My interest in trace gases (gases which exist in extremely small quantities in the atmosphere) has been a trace itself for most of my life; today these gases fill most of my daytime, and I must admit that I enjoy it quite a lot. The unpredictable happens more often than it should. This is a beautiful transition to jazz. Jam sessions are illustrations of the unpredictable becoming the rule. Is this why I am addicted to jazz….?
Writing stuff and sharing pictures on AAJ is rather different from writing science papers, but sharing my own discoveries, in jazz as in science, and perhaps some thoughts, is pure joy. I have a profound admiration for musicians, in particular jazz musicians.
Scientists spend their time trying to get close to understanding the universe. For a single moment, jazz musicians achieve it. We try to explain. They explain nothing: they simply are, elegantly. They open the doors of infinity for us and let us glimpse its blinding light. All we can do is pack up our tools.
To this day, I cannot believe that one evening of my life I drank champagne with Cecil Taylor. Yet, my passion today is not to chase after the past. Today's jazz is teeming with incredible musicians who continue to show us that the world is beautiful. This is what I try to show here.
My Articles | Year End Picks | Album ReviewsMy preferred album format: Digital
