Liam O’Dell: Testing out Paraorchestra’s TouchSound device

Haptic, vibration-based tech appears to be growing in popularity. It was just a couple of months ago that I was invited by Vodafone to try out a vibrating suit at the Mighty Hoopla music festival. Now, the kind folks at the disability music group Paraorchestra asked if I wanted to try out their take on the tech.

It’s called TouchSound, and is immediately a lot less heavier than wearing a full-blown chest pack and additional devices on my wrists and ankles. It fits comfortably into the palm of my hand, and with a small microphone at the end, it converts sound into vibrations which can be felt through a small touch pad big enough for your index finger (though not for fat thumbs like mine). There is also a dial to increase the intensity, should you wish.

The event at London’s Southbank Centre. which we – that is, myself and three other deaf people with various levels of deafness – would use them for was equally intriguing. The Paraorchestra were playing Steve Reich’s ‘Four Sections’ in a performance titled ‘The Anatomy of the Orchestra’, one which would show off all the different instruments as the piece progresses.

Although, rather than have the orchestra clumped together in a semicircle around the conductor, this event saw individuals and their instruments scattered around the auditorium, for audience members to gravitate towards as they saw fit. This is where the TouchSound devices, and their portability, came in.

The fact I was being asked for feedback and that the tech is still in development means I have to be somewhat sympathetic to the fact it is isn’t perfect, but I certainly found it to be impressive. As you glide across the room and pay attention to different instruments, a clear flow – rise and fall – in vibrations can be felt in the device. Similarly, standing between two musicians gives you an incredible blend of the two where a note is played at the same time or there’s another crossover in the melodies.

It’s almost like a 360-degree sphere or soundscape being created on the touchpad. As I place my index finger onto it when I visit the percussionist and pianist, the thumping timpani pulses at the centre, but it’s in the right-hand corner where the faint piano melody buzzes on the top. Something similar happens when I face the violins and cellos, where the lower tones of the cellos take centre stage with a sprinkling of frill from the violins.

Though it has to be noted that all instruments are easily picked up by the TouchSound device. At one point I was close to clarinet and flute players, both playing higher notes during the piece, and the flute was impossible to detect, with the clarinet being only a slight improvement with its sharp, pointed and repeated notes.

Ultimately, there’s some mental gymnastics required in trying to piece what each of the different vibrations are supposed to represent. It was easier with the aforementioned Vodafone suit, where the ankle tags represented the grounding bass, the chest vibrations echoed the diaphragm used to sing the vocals and the wrist tags were akin to the clapping of the audience. It was easy to rely on intuition to ascertain what each buzz symbolised. With TouchSound, the process isn’t as straightforward.

I have some residual hearing in addition to my moderate-to-severe deafness, and that certainly helped me figure out what each vibration was supposed to represent, but it was interesting learning how that experienced differed for the Deaf testers who were British Sign Language (BSL) users and cochlear implant users who likely didn’t have the same level of residual hearing as I had. Their process of mapping the vibrations to the sound was different, as they spoke of paying particular attention to the movement of fingers on woodwind instruments and the sweeping gestures of the string players.

And essentially, in my case, there was a pretty stark contrast in what my ears were hearing and what my TouchSound device was telling me. The clarinet had loud, high-pitched notes towards the end – as mentioned previously – and they stood out against the general buzz of the rest of the orchestra, but the TouchSound had swapped the two around, opting to focus more on the background sounds than what was right in front of me. Adjusting the sensitivity dial would introduce it into the vibrations I could experience on the sound pad, but it would also amplify the ambience I was trying to separate the clarinet.

It was like – to repeat a poorly adapted proverb I gave to the representatives chairing the feedback session – finding a clarinet melody in an audio haystack.

Hopefully in time, improvements are made to enhance the experience, but it was one I certainly enjoyed at this stage in development. I understand the tech was designed specifically for the interactive, open space performance of ‘The Anatomy of the Orchestra’, but there are plans to expand its use outwards – and I’m genuinely excited to see where TouchSound goes next.

By Liam O’Dell. Liam is an award-winning Deaf freelance journalist and campaigner from Bedfordshire. He can be found talking about disability, theatre, politics and more on Twitter and on his website.