A multi-channel vibrotactile speaker system for a more equally shared musical experience between the deaf and the hearing individuals

Tactile modality represents an interesting sensory modality that is being particularly explored to enable the deaf individuals to access the musical experience through the technologie. However, most of the audio-tactile technologies developed in the scientific works or sold commercially today focus on how transforming the existing music into vibrations. As a result, vibrotactile music composition, i.e. using vibrations to create music for the body, is largely unexplored. We argue that this discipline could encourage more equal interaction and equally sharing of the musical experience between the deaf and the hearing individuals. That’s why, in this paper, we present a multi-channel vibrotactile speaker designed to achieve this goal. The speaker is designed to reproduce analog audio signals from a standard electro-acoustic (source; audio interface; amplifier), and can be built for a cost ranging from around 200 € to 600 €, depending on the access to a large-format 3D printer.