The Nature of Sonic Geometry: A Conversation with Eric Rankin
‘Impression Figure’ of recorded sound by Margaret Watts Hughes, Late 1800s.
Molly Hankins December 4, 2025
As more and more mainstream scientific breakthroughs sit at the intersection of quantum physics, human consciousness and mathematics, it’s unusual to find a layman at the forefront of revolutionary research. Enter Eric Rankin, the musician, author and channeler of a body of verified information connecting the major chords on a musical scale with the sum total angles of basic geometric shapes. First put forth in a YouTube video he called ‘Sonic Geometry: the Language of Frequency and Form’ in 2013, Rankin never imagined how sharing this knowledge would impact the trajectory of his life. Discovering this symmetry between geometric and harmonic aspects of the universe has led to his work being discussed alongside world-famous scientists and academics. All the while he’s been living in Laguna Beach, playing in two different bands and teaching a Sonic Geometry class at The Integratron in Joshua Tree.
Approximately 2500 years ago, Pythagoras claimed that “there is geometry in the humming of the strings.” Although sometimes embarrassed by the accolades of credentialed academics, Rankin is the person credited with revealing the correlation between geometry, frequency and major-chord harmonics. “Humans seem to have been ‘designed or programmed’ as major-chord resonators,” he says, speaking of the sense of well-being major chords give us. It’s a similar feeling to hearing music tuned to 432 Hz, which Rankin is also naturally interested in because of patterns that connect to physics, music theory, nature, growth algorithms and spiritual teachings.
The number of vibrational cycles per second determines a sound’s measurement in hertz. When asked about musical tuning, Rankin explained why some Hertz levels, like 432, feel better to many of us physically than others. “432 is kind of a core number, which people are starting to hear about now. If you octave that down to 216, half value, then octave that down again you get 108. A Hindu mala necklace has 108 beads, the meditating Buddha has 108 snails cooling his head while he meditates,” Rankin said. “Our moon is 108 moon-widths away from Earth, our sun is 108 sun-widths away from Earth. So you go, what is going on here that we’ve just been ignorant of? And we wouldn’t have known this until we could measure the moon and the sun and the Earth, that’s just in the last 100, maybe 150 years.” He believes this symmetry, revealed only by the imperial measurement system, is a divine communication meant to be unlocked at a certain phase of human evolution and acts as an invitation to pay attention to the underlying order of life.
At a cymatics lab, where sound is projected into matter to form geometric patterns, Rankin played a scale of major chords, one at a time in sequence and “something showed up that they’d never seen. Rather than a flat-looking beautiful geometric standing wave pattern, it looked like a living lotus that was flowering where petals were actually layered on top of other petals.” The lotus is a Buddhist symbol for awakening, reminding us that we all have the same potential to achieve enlightenment like the Buddha. The number of equally compelling examples Rankin is able to name of frequency measurements corresponding to sacred geometry, symbols and structures, is completely astounding, but he thinks we’ve barely scratched the surface of all there is to know. Sound projected into matter, with certain frequencies resulting in more beauty and dimensionality than others, might be an indicator of how life was created, and how we are co-creating it with the vibration of our thoughts, words and deeds.
Rankin’s work has attracted the likes of physicist Menas Kafatos and Sir Robert Edward Grant, who produced the follow-up video to Sonic Geometry which deals with the platonic solids. Kafatos appeared on Rankin’s weekly podcast and radio show in Orange County, Awakening Code Radio, and told us that “today’s science is much more mystical than people make it out to be, including scientists.” Perhaps the underlying truth of geometric correspondence to harmonics, which is inherently mystical, could only come through a non-scientist in a non-academic setting. Sonic Geometry points to natural intelligence that wants to reveal itself, so why wouldn’t that natural intelligence find an unbiased channel who understands the fundamental nature of harmonics and the emotional effect they have on other beings? That’s a perspective unique to musicians, and Rankin has no doubt that’s at least part of the reason this knowledge wanted to come through him.
“Suddenly, every geometric shape, the foundation of what we call reality, would actually be in literal harmony within Earth’s vibrational field. It’s just like engines having harmonic balancers to keep them running smoothly".”
“There’s been an internal guidance system in place my whole life. I could say it’s my interest in music, or my interest in dolphins and their amazing abilities,” he explained, referencing the years he spent as a boat captain that led him to study dolphins and write a book about them. Those interests gave him the requisite framework he needed to receive the knowledge of Sonic Geometry, which came in one fine flash in August of 2012. He heard a voice of higher intelligence he had previously only experienced during medical emergencies, so he attributed it to a guardian angel of sorts. The voice told him to go to the white board and draw a triangle, write down the sum total of its angles, then play the sum as a tone. “I had a musical background so I understood Hertz cycles to a degree, so I thought ok - how do I play the sum total? And the voice said, ‘You’re living in a moment in time where you can do that, pick up your phone.’ So I looked up an app and did it.”
Within a few moments, he was generating a 180 hz tone to match the sum total of a triangle, and continued going up the scale of the sum total of a square, pentagon and so on to discover the progression of major-chord harmonics “We seem to have been programmed as a resonators, that when we hear major chords we relax and go, ‘Ah, that’s right.’ Other chords might stir other feelings, all the way to minor chords, which feel like danger,” Rankin observes. “So if the universe is geometric in essence, then it is also major-chord harmonic in essence.” To illustrate this point in the Sonic Geometry class Rankin teaches at The Integratron, he uses a keyboard during his lecture so he can play each shape as sound. The relaxation we experienced when those major chords were played felt physically, mentally, spiritually and emotionally harmonizing.
The Integratron is an acoustically perfect chamber conceived as a frequency harmonizing machine by the man who built it, George Van Tassel. Van Tassel believed the world’s pyramids were actually huge “harmonic balancers,” and Rankin asks, “Harmonic to what?”. His answer was the Schumann Resonance, which measures the time it takes electromagnetic waves to bounce between the surface of the Earth and base of the ionosphere, and is typically resting at approximately 7.83 Hz. “What if, thousands of years ago, that resonance field was just 1 Hz higher, hovering at a perfect 9? Suddenly, every geometric shape, the foundation of what we call reality, would actually be in literal harmony within Earth’s vibrational field. It’s just like engines having harmonic balancers to keep them running smoothly,” he says. This sort of speculation has made him a darling on the American TV show Ancient Aliens - like what if the capstone that once topped The Great Pyramid was harmonizing the planet by boosting its frequency to 9 Hz?
Rankin has not discovered how to use this information beyond the deployment of sound to create harmonic states of being. He has, however, mapped the information in what he calls a Factor 9 grid based on the frequencies of Hertz cycles that add up to 9, such as 432 Hz (4+3+2 = 9). “When we start with 432 Hz and move up and down by multiples of 9, an astonishing 14-tone matrix of synchronicity begins to appear. For instance, on this unique grid we find not just some, but all of the numbers representing every primary geometric shape,” he explains in Sonic Geometry 2. “Looking deeper, we see many other numbers that played into some of humanity’s most profound religious texts - the 72 names of God in the Kabbalah. There’s 108, the number of times Hindu mantras are repeated in ceremonies. We find 144, a number sequence represented in the Great Pyramid of Giza, the number of days in a Mayan baktun.” A baktun is the total length of the Mayan calendar, 144,000 days. 144,000 is also the number of souls that must awaken in order for the planet to move into a higher field of consciousness.
What is this information trying to tell us? “In a word, it’s harmony,” Rankin says. “When we play together as frequencies the numbers of all the primary geometric shapes, what presents itself is a three-tone, numerically perfect major chord. This phenomenon should not be taken lightly, for what we are seeing is a certain kind of proof that nature has revealed by mathematical patterns is a force existing in literal harmony with itself.” If harmony is built into the blueprint of our material lives, perhaps seeking harmony within ourselves, relationships, and communities is what being alive is all about. All of the “Great Work” that alchemists, magicians, meditators and religious practitioners are dedicated to involves some expression of harmonization. Rather than trying to practically apply the teachings of Sonic Geometry, when we apply it philosophically life becomes quite simple - creating harmony is all that matters.
Molly Hankins is an Initiate + Reality Hacker serving the Ministry of Quantum Existentialism and Builders of the Adytum.
