Bailey-Salgado Project

In early 2010, José Francisco Salgado, an astronomer and science visualizer at the Adler Planetarium in Chicago, edited nighttime footage he had taken at the Paranal Observatory to the track Spirit by Babble, an electronic band led by Tom Bailey after the Thompson Twins disbanded. Salgado called the piece "Under Paranal Skies" and presented it at the 215th Meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Washington, DC.[1] The reception given to "Under Paranal Skies" prompted Salgado to contact Bailey to share the piece and get official permission to use the music. Bailey was pleased to learn how well his music suited Salgado's project and suggested composing new music for a future project.[2]

Their first project together was Sidereal Motion, a four-movement film about the night sky[3] as photographed from five astronomical observatories around the world. "Under Paranal Skies" is the fourth movement of the film but with new music inspired by the visuals.

On 27 October 2010 the Bailey-Salgado Project previewed Sidereal Motion at the 7th international conference on the Inspiration of Astronomical Phenomena (INSAP) at the Bath Royal Literary & Scientific Institution in Bath, England[4] with Bailey improvising on keyboard.