Vibrating glove to augment kids' piano lessons

mmt-2The Georgia Tech Center for Music Technology (redundant?) has come up with an interesting gadget that works as both hand rehabilitation aid and keyboard tutor. The “Mobile Music Touch” is essentially a glove with a motor in each finger which vibrates when that finger needs to play a note. It’s intended as a therapeutic tool for patients undergoing rehabilitation, but it can also be used to add an extra layer of muscle memory to keyboard lessons.

It only works with a few songs at the moment with special software, but they think they can adapt it to work with mp3 players. A pilot study was done which found that learners with the glove learned new songs faster than those without. Makes sense, but I’d rather my kids stayed away from vibrating robo-claws and learned to play the piano the old-school way.

[via Yahoo!]