Music Seat

I previously assisted in a study under the supervision of Dr. Eunsung Song about creating tactile music for the hearing impaired, enabling them to feel music as vibrations. At that time, I wanted to find out if people could feel the joy of music by the use of body parts other than their ears. In this experiment, I helped to test whether a hearing-impaired person could feel a minute difference in vibration (threshold of audibility) with the tip of their index finger. We used the principle of hearing aids, which amplify sound to a size beyond the hearing threshold of patients with hearing difficulties but at the same time compress the sound to a proper range so as not to make the hearer feel discomfort from sounds that are too loud. Tactile testing was conducted to convert high-frequency areas that hearing aids cannot recognize into low-tactile areas. The results of this experiment enabled us to deliver music through vibration without distortion of the original music flow. Later on, this research was commercialized by Hyundai Motors with their “Music Seat.”

Please check the website for more information on the projects >>>“Music Seat.”