Adrienne Block explores what's underneath the humongous ice sheets of Antarctica.

Part of Something Amazing

Adrienne Block plays the bassoon, closes her eyes, and gets lost in the music.

30 Second Science with Adrienne Block

We give Adrienne Block 30 seconds to describe her science and she does a little dance.

10 Questions for Adrienne Block

We ask Adrienne Block 10 questions and she refuses to sing "Bohemian Rhapsody."

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Turn up the heat

When you do your research at the South Pole, you have to make some sacrifices. Two of the things Adrienne Block always misses while doing her research are jeans and her bassoon. She told us that you don’t wear jeans at the South Pole because wool inevitably wins out over cotton in the Antarctic freeze. Likewise, Adrienne doesn’t take her bassoon to the bottom of the earth since she fears the weather would crack it in two. (She did take a harmonica on one trip… but it wasn’t the same.) Adrienne actually also harbors a fear that the weather may crack her in two (“I hate cold—I’m cold when I go to the movie theatre!”) So why does she keep going back? Adrienne explains:

“The thing that helps me get over how cold it is… is that Antarctica has so many great unknowns—so many questions that no one has any idea about, just because no one’s ever been there before, or no one’s ever collected data there before, or no one’s collected enough data. And I think it’s the fact that you can go there and be an expert–instantly be the person that knows the most about an area—just because you were there for two months.”

Two months ??

Stay warm, Adrienne.

I Was Glowing Back At Them

Given her fascination with all things gigantic (the endless ice sheets of Antarctica that she studies, the huge bassoon that she plays so beautifully), it should come as no surprise that Adrienne Block’s love of the large started when she was just a young girl. Sitting alone in her Ohio backyard, young Adrienne—already something of a perfectionist—would gaze at the infinite nighttime sky and feel like any mistakes she made were perhaps not so bad in the wider scope of things. And the sky reached into her heart, too:

“Seeing the constellations come up was a little like seeing a bright light slowly come on. I don’t know, it just made me smile from the inside—it just made me feel like I was glowing back at them. I think the experience I had as a kid with thinking about how big things were and thinking about how small my mistakes were was a little bit spiritual. Both in that it allowed me to forgive myself, but also in that it made me feel so special to be loved. You know, you can look at the universe and think it’s so enormous and I’m so small… but Mom loves me, Dad loves me. And that made me feel really special.”

When she was in college, Adrienne switched from studying what was above her—the sky–to studying what was below her—the Earth—and she’s now a geologist. She does much of her research in Antarctica, which because of the sun, the ice, and the snow, is one of the very brightest places on Earth. So Adrienne has definitely changed the direction of her gaze… but we get the feeling she’s still looking at the same light.

Ask Adrienne Your Questions


Q: Donavier Mosley
I play the baritone and bassoon. How do you play the high notes so well?

A: Adrienne
A:
HA! I never expected anyone would compliment my playing! I consider myself a sturdy second bassoon. I think the high notes are all about airspeed. My teacher taught me to “sizzle” the air passed the embouchure. The more you listen to bassoon the better you’ll know what you want your sound to be. Getting to that sound is the hard part because there are so many factors… never underestimate the importance of the reed!

Q: Sid Halsband
Is your mission to get out to schools to help inspire young minds? To show what can be possible for anyone who has the desire, and the courage to not only make their lives better but also all our lives better.

A:
You will be happy to know that I do regularly volunteer in school and other groups like the girl scouts. Right now, I spend one day a week teaching statistics to high school students at the Frederick Douglass Academy in Harlem. This week, they will be combining what they’ve learned about linear regression and standard deviation in a lesson that has them looking for significantly bright spots under the ice sheet– i.e. places where there may be water!! I get questions about how many years you have to be in school to become a doctor and getting a master’s degree…. It is great to see these students are thinking that far ahead. If there were 8 days a week, I’d spend 2 of them in schools!

Q: fjdbassplayer
How do you keep your lips from freezing?

A: This is a relevant question even if not playing bassoon in East Antarctica!! Even when it is -27 deg F, your biggest enemy is the wind. Add to that, you have your nose constantly dumping moisture on your upper lip. I wore a neck cozy all the time that I would pull up over my lips. There were times at South Pole I didn’t need my parka… just a fleece and the neck cozy. Very essential!

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