With just the shift of her eyes across the screen of a computer, a cerebral palsy patient fills the air with harp music.
A Reuters report describes how 21-year-old Alexandra Kerlidou sits in her wheelchair on a stage in Athens. Here, the disabled student who cannot speak or use her hands is seen playing the "Eyeharp," a gaze-control digital software that enables an individual with a disability to play music, something Kerlidou had never thought possible.
Describing the experience, the 21-year-old said, she felt strange and had never imagined such a thing — the use of speech-generating computer program as she described trying for the first time, the Eyeharp in her home on Lesbos with Zacharias Vamvakousis, the technology's creator.
Inspiration to Develop 'Eyeharp'
Vamvakousis, a computer scientist and musician, was inspired to develop the program after a musician friend was hurt in a vehicular accident shortly before a concert where they would play together.
In the beginning, the developer said that one of his friends who was playing the Cretan Iyra shared that it was unclear if he would be able to move his arms and hands and play music again. He added it shocked him, and he realized there is a need for such a technology.
This digital eye-tracking technology, commonly used in gaming, medicine, and security, monitors the movement of the eye to perform commands.
Essentially, the interface enables creating arpeggios and controlling their harmony while melodies are played on top of them. To achieve this, the interface comprises two layers which include the melody layer and the step-sequencer layer.
The eye rests on every musical note spaced out on a wheel on the screen, and average can play three to four notes a second. This report also specified, such a program can "play" 25 musical instruments.
A similar CNA Insider report specified, without doing this digitally, Vamvakousis explained, playing music in real-time would never be possible. Eyeharp, he continued, takes away the actual action of strumming a cord.
Discipline and Concentration Needed
The software's developer said that the program needs discipline and concentration, as one needs to keep the eyes from wandering too fast to the next note, although students are thrilled, hearing their efforts.
Most of the children, he continued, initially begin with the drum sound "just to interact with the environment right now."
Vamvakousis has taught the program in special-needs schools in Barcelona, where he studied. With the technology, he added, over 2,000 people have downloaded the program.
Due to the pandemic, he presently teaches online, mostly children who have cerebral palsy, described in Mayo Clinic as a group of disorders affecting muscle tone and movement or posture.
Describing how they felt after seeing the 21-year-old play the harp, Kerlidou's father, Anastasios said, he cried, and the mother cried too after their daughter first played the Eyeharp, described by the Universitat Pompeu Fabra as an open-source that is free for downloading and use.
The student, who wants to work as a computer programmer after she finishes school, likes the piano, not to mention popular Greek songs. She shared she could not imagine her life without music adding; when she is sad or happy, she puts on music.
Related information about EyeHarp is shown on the EyeHarp Project's YouTube video below:
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