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DAW 2020 – The Musical Vibrations project

Posted in News

This week is Deaf Awareness Week and the 2020 theme is ‘Acquired deafness’.

Today we highlight a video from The University of Liverpool’s The Musical Vibrations project (see weblink: https://stream.liv.ac.uk/yw6f6xvp).

Professor Carl Hopkins explains “The Musical Vibrations project (www.musicalvibrations.com) is being used to demonstrate the potential of vibrotactile feedback to support d/Deaf people in music performance, education, appreciation and production. The vibrotactile technology converts musical sounds that can be heard, into vibrations which are felt through the skin as vibrotactile feedback. This heartwarming video documents the time we invited WJ, who became profoundly-deaf in mid-life, to come and ‘feel’ one of her favourite songs from the past (“In the air tonight” by Phil Collins) in the Acoustics Research Unit at the University of Liverpool.”

In relation to The Musical Vibrations project, Professor Carl also shared a video Vibrotactile technology to support d/Deaf people in music education: When Musical Vibrations met Royal School for the Deaf Derby’. (Video link: https://stream.liv.ac.uk/2qvwd9th).  This video documents the responses of staff and pupils at the Royal School for the Deaf Derby who used the vibrotactile equipment in their music lessons.