The popular science book and phenomenon “How to Die in Space” takes people on interstellar flights of imagination to explore mind-bending events people could not survive: black holes, supernovas, the birth of a star.
Jacey Schell, an audio engineering major at the Frost School of Music, has expanded that already soaring journey by imagining what those experiences would sound like. The rising senior has created the soundtrack for the Phillip and Patricia Frost Science Museum’s new show “How to Die in Space: An Interactive Adventure Through the Cosmos” which opened at the downtown Miami museum’s Frost Planetarium this past weekend.
The project was a learning process for Schell, who is in the Frost School’s 4 + 1 combined bachelor’s and master’s program, on many levels. “My score/audio creation process began with research,” she said. “In order to sonically capture these death experiences, I had to truly understand all of the space terms that I was reading.”
The immersive, interactive planetarium show is the first to be based on the bestselling book by Paul Sutter, an astrophysicist, NASA adviser, and science communicator whose darkly hilarious explanations of astrophysical phenomena have made him a favorite on television and online shows and his own hit podcast “Ask a Spaceman.”
Schell was brought onto the project thanks to Frost Science’s commitment to partnering with other educational institutions. “We like to champion our local universities and collaborate with them,” said Analisa Duran, the museum’s Knight Vice President of Science Education. “They have so many awesome resources and so much talent. We learn from them and they learn from us.”
The show lets guests choose from spectacular—and deadly—events on an imaginary inter-galactic adventure, using suspense and humor to teach about cosmological phenomena. “How to Die in Space” is the first release from the museum’s Frost Science Studios, a new initiative to produce original planetarium content for distribution worldwide, positioning the museum as a leader in immersive science storytelling.
“The audio is important,” said Duran. “It sets the ambiance and the atmosphere. The show is meant to be humorous and conversational, to take complex ideas like the universe and the cosmos and make them fun. The music sets the stage for that.”
(Students at the University of Miami Frost Institute for Data Science and Computing also contributed by designing pre-show graphics.)
The stage for the collaboration was set when Tom Collins, associate professor of music engineering technology at the Frost School, was introduced to the planetarium’s director while attending an event with FilmGate Miami – a center for innovative film, new media, and immersive storytelling with whom Collins has collaborated—at Frost Science in 2024. That director left, but his successor later reached out to Collins about “How to Die in Space.”
“As soon as I hear about immersive sound or interactive audiovisual experiences I’m interested,” said Collins, who has spearheaded innovative AI music projects at the Frost School. “We have students getting training in that area, so it’s great for them to have a chance to put that into action.”
Schell was chosen from a group of audio engineering and media composition students by Collins, fellow audio engineering faculty member Susan Green, theory and composition professors Charles Mason and Juraj Kojs; and media scoring and production lecturer Camilo Rodriguez. Their range of expertise reflects the complexity of creating the “How to Die in Space” soundtrack.
“I think of it as sculpting with sound in a three-dimensional space,” said Collins, who with Green served as Schell’s musical advisor. “That’s the musical and engineering challenge.”
Schell, who in addition to being a composer/songwriter and engineer plays bass guitar and classical bassoon, said she has always been drawn to musical storytelling. “I have been wanting to dive into sculpting an immersive audio experience for quite some time,” said Schell, who has contributed to Collins’ AI projects. “I've worked on sound design projects before in both personal initiatives and academic ones, but I was really excited at the opportunity to explore sound design in a professional audio-visual environment.”
That opportunity required a combination of conceptual and creative imagination, technical skill, and resourcefulness. Schell, who used the Logic Pro and Reaper programs, says she created sounds from scratch, layering them to build “an intense, yet ambient sonic environment.”
“Humans can’t actually hear sound in space,” said Schell. “The only real sound we have from space is through data sonification [the audio equivalent of data visualization], and I find that so interesting.”
On a practical level, Schell dedicated significant time on-site in the planetarium, tailoring her soundtrack for its complex, multi-speaker setup.
“The best part of the experience was hearing my audio in the planetarium for the first time,” she said. “It’s a completely different experience from listening on headphones or stereo speakers.”
Duran praised Schell’s creativity and commitment. “I love it when I have a student who’s responsive, excited, and really wants to be part of the project,” she said. “The score really brought the show together.”
“How to Die in Space” is playing daily at the Frost Planetarium. Duran hopes to eventually distribute it to other planetariums, potentially reaching audiences far beyond Miami.
“It would be really cool to see the show expand nationally,” said Schell. “It feels great to know that I'm making an impact on peoples' experiences through my work. My biggest hope is that when attendees leave the planetarium, they leave feeling as though they have just returned from a journey to space.”
