Music Between Us is a set of wearable musical instruments, meant to be worn by two (or potentially more) users at a time. It takes the form of embroidered jackets that when touched, triggers a range of melodic and rhythmic elements that are added to an existing soundscape. The soundscape begins with a “heartbeat” percussive piece that continues for the duration of the soundscape. The variety of sounds builds as the users interact with each other by making contact with the embroidered elements on their jackets, occasionally including additional percussive elements as contact between the users intensifies.
The regions of embroidered elements on the jacket represent a topography of meanings — some locations on the jacket may suggest a more casual connection and others, more intimate. The piece invites users to explore and play with the boundaries of comfort, in touching and being touched. The piece is also a social experiment in the sense of prompting the users whether their default boundaries of comfort would be altered under the context of art and play.
PROJECT TYPE: Collaboration with Rashida Kamal
SHOWCASED AT: ITP Winter Show 2018 Selection. Tisch School of the Arts, NYU. 16 - 17, December, 2018
CODE: github
TECHNICAL DETAILS: The wireless wearable jacket is is constructed using a polyester base material and conductive thread for the embroidery and circuit connection. Areas of embroidery are used for input for the capacitive touch sensors (MPR121) and the users' touch data is communicated via Bluetooth over the Web Bluetooth API to trigger sounds over the web. Each of the sounds that can be triggered via capacitive touch sensors are initially composed as a soundscape designed in the way that regardless of how many sounds are triggered, the soundscape sounds natural and reflective of the level of touches between the participants.
