A system to assist visually disabled musicians to participate in orchestras

Abstract

Music is an activity primarily associated with the capacity to hear, but in Western forms there is a significant emphasis on an orchestral musician's ability to see when rehearsing and performing. In both of these circumstances, the musician relies on being able to see the conductor's cues in order to translate the physical gestures into musical expression, feeling, tempo and musical emphases. The rehearsal environment is even more complicated in that there are often sporadic musical entry-points as the ensemble jumps between sections of a score. This paper outlines early-stage research which aims to alleviate some of the difficulties encountered by blind musicians in an orchestral environment.