Notes on Rankin-Cohen brackets

Abstract

The Rankin-Cohen product of two modular forms is known to be a modular form. The same formula can be used to define the Rankin-Cohen product of two holomorphic functions f and g on the upper half-plane. Assuming that this product is a modular form, we prove that both f and g are modular forms if one of them is. We interpret this result in terms of solutions of linear ordinary differential equations.