Vijay Iyer‘s mind is a little bit terrifying. A MacArthur-certified “genius,” he earned degrees in mathematics and physics from Yale and Berkeley before committing to a career as a pianist and composer. His STEM background profoundly informs his music-making, from using the sequence of Fibonacci numbers to structure his work, to applying theories of embodied and situated cognition in his study of the music of the African diaspora. The New York Times has called Iyer a “social conscience, multimedia collaborator, system builder, rhapsodist, historical thinker and multicultural gateway.”

But when I sat down with Vijay for this conversation at the Big Ears Festival in Knoxville, Tenn., (where we each performed during a weekend of music representing a breathtaking array of traditions and aesthetics), I wasn’t really focused on the intimidating power of his remarkable mind. Instead, I was acutely aware of the heart and soul in music — its capacity to create understanding and communication. At Big Ears, you can make your way from a traditional bluegrass set to an Indian jalatharangam performance, traversing continents, cultures and centuries as you cross the street between two venues.

So Vijay and I talked about listening. The alertness of listening in the creative states of improvising, composing and collaborating with other musicians. The importance of listening to your history and lineage, and the agility of listening to the present tense of the world around you. The ability to listen across borders of geography and language, affirming the humanity and empathy that comes with it. In the end, it was Vijay who brought up an emotion that’s the antithesis of anything cerebral. “It feels like family,” he said. “To really hear everything that’s happening in the music and also hear what a person is saying and hear what they have to offer as a human being. It’s really this deep love that is at the heart of it.”