Music by the numbers: from Pythagoras to Schoenberg

Prologue: A world in crisis

String theory, 500 BCE

Sidebar A. It's all about nomenclatures

Enlightenment

The great string debate, 1730-1780

Sidebar B. The Slinky

A most precious gift

Musical temperament

Sidebar C. Music for the record books: the lowest, the longest, the oldest, and the weirdest

Musical gadgets: the tuning fork and the metronome

Rhythm, meter, and metric

Frames of reference: where am I?

Sidebar D. Musical hierarchies

Relativistic music

Aftermath

Sidebar E. The Bernoulli

The last Pythagoreans.