Through haptics technology and a recent grant, the Portland nonprofit expands its mission to make music more accessible
Nate Hergert, like other deaf or hard-of-hearing people, also referred to as DHH, has to feel music through vibrations.
Hergert is the principal investigator and project director at CymaSpace, a nonprofit with a mission to make “arts, media and culture accessible and inclusive to the Deaf and Hard of Hearing through technology, education and outreach.” Hergert and Shawn Trail, research and production coordinator, believe music is innate for all humans, going back to the drumbeat in early civilizations and the heartbeat.
CymaSpace’s mission and Hergert and Trail’s goal to make music more accessible to the DHH community got a big boost Oct. 2.
Thanks to a $97,000 Oregon Community Foundation, or OCF, Creative Heights Grant, CymaSpace is expanding its work, bringing music to other people in the DHH community by developing technology that translates music from an auditory sensation to a physical one.
“Universal music design builds on the idea of all the senses coming together in music,” Trail said. “Regardless of a disability or limitation, we can tap into the universal nature of music and afford a deaf person or a person with another type of disability potentially to experience music in ways that weren’t afforded in our hearing-able only convention.”
CymaSpace and haptics
Founded by Myles de Bastion 10 years ago, CymaSpace is located on Southeast Haig Street in Portland. The nonprofit offers programs like SignKids, where children bridge the deaf and hearing world through art, play and American Sign Language, or ASL.
The CymaSpace environment is quiet but interactive, and communication is enhanced here with a tool incorporating speech-to-text on a screen with large captions for speakers. In addition to this, a multi-colored lighting system covers part of one wall, and an LED piano with colorful synchronized lights stands out.
De Bastion was born with progressive hearing loss and now develops art and technology allowing sound to be experienced as light, motion and vibration. This transformation from sound to a tactile and visual experience is the basis for haptics at CymaSpace. Haptics can be used to create a physical and sensory experience for DHH people.
With their focus and expertise, Hergert and Trail are a dynamic team, combining their knowledge to bring music to the DHH community through technology. Hergert, with a business degree from Rochester Institute of Technology, is a musician and self-taught audio engineer. Trail has a doctorate in computer science.
Hergert has a cochlear implant and uses ASL. However, there are limitations to the range of sounds he can hear. Hergert relies heavily on his sense of sight and believes technology can add more visual tools for DHH people.
About 50% of DHH people in Oregon use ASL, according to Hergert. Some have hearing aids or cochlear implants and some use signs and speech. ASL interpreters often provide a link to speaking, but when it comes to music, an interpreter can only portray the words of a song and basic rhythm through movement.
Understandably, Hergert wants to engage others with the music he enjoys, from heavy metal to classical and his own compositions. He wants deaf people to take ownership of sound and plans to take the CymaSpace mission a step further.
“The deaf people have no sense of sound; there’s nothing here,” Hergert said. “It’s more muted somehow. Based on vibrations, frequency, beats and rhythm become familiar. With haptics, a deaf person reacts to the vibrations the same way a hearing person reacts to the sound.”
With this in mind, Hergert is using the OCF grant money to build tools for reaching DHH people, like a dance floor where people can feel the vibrations through their feet and see the multicolored lights synchronized to different music tones.
Another example of a tool for feeling music through vibrations is the SUBPAC, a product Hergert and Trail have access to. The SUBPAC, which operates on some of the ideas they are developing, has received positive reviews from DHH users.
The grant period
Hergert and Trail are spending the first 90 days of the OCF-funded project on research. They will experiment with equipment and invite audiologists, musicians and technology experts to share expertise. They will also incorporate feedback from DHH individuals.
“We're just starting with sound,” Hergert said. “We want to have it so deaf people can recognize sound from how the haptics feel. The dance floor is a concept for establishing a universal approach to music and sound in general. How do we get deaf people in the picture? It means potentially changing the music style.”
Hergert used the example of his favorite band, Tool, to explain how music creates energy and emotion. He remembers sitting in the front row at a Tool concert in Vancouver, BC, Canada.
“Taking the way a song makes a feeling, like energetic, I’m converting that information to the deaf community through haptics,” Hergert said, comparing the concept to how Tool used lasers to add a visual companion to the music during their live performance.
Hergert and Trail work out of the Confluence Studio in Troutdale. Hergert worked with an audio architect to construct the space with soundproofing materials for recording and creating music. Grant money will also go towards setting up studio equipment for different artists.
“It’s named Confluence because it’s at the confluence of the Sandy and Columbia Rivers but also a confluence of haptics and lighting and auditory,” Trail said. “We wanted it to be a confluence of abilities too so we could have collaborations of people with different disabilities or abilities.”
Advocating for the deaf community
Hergert’s social justice efforts regarding the DHH community extend beyond music. He wrote letters to the Portland Bureau of Transportation asking for more accommodations for DHH riders. For example, when the bus is about to stop, it would be helpful to have a screen that alerts riders in addition to the high-pitched sounds that many can’t hear.
Hergert also contacted airlines with recommendations for improving travel experiences and providing more entertainment options. He cites JetBlue as the best so far.
Always on the lookout for ways to make the world more accessible for DHH people, Hergert and Trail look forward to researching and implementing technology, bringing all the senses together.
“Data collecting around deaf culture I find to be invaluable,” Trail said. “It’s a constant cycle of collaboration. It’s amazing that we got this grant.”
CymaSpace advocates for access, inclusion and equity. The idea is to present music for hearing and DHH people to simultaneously enjoy. Hergert and Trail plan to involve DHH people in the process.
“What is music?” Trail asked. “People might like avant-garde music like standing on a corner and listening to a bus drive by, and that’s the sound. Or John Cage’s Silence, where everybody gathers in the auditorium, and the pianist walks out and just sits there. It’s a deep listening practice, and the composition changes every time.
“If the community decides that’s music, then it’s music.”
Street Roots is an award-winning weekly investigative publication covering economic, environmental and social inequity. The newspaper is sold in Portland, Oregon, by people experiencing homelessness and/or extreme poverty as means of earning an income with dignity. Street Roots newspaper operates independently of Street Roots advocacy and is a part of the Street Roots organization. Learn more about Street Roots. Support your community newspaper by making a one-time or recurring gift today.
© 2023 Street Roots. All rights reserved. | To request permission to reuse content, email editor@streetroots.org or call 503-228-5657, ext. 404
