Imogen Heap just reinvented music with a pair of magic gloves. No bigs.
Aside from her distinctively melodic voice, Imogen Heap is best known for mesmerizing lullabies like “Hide And Seek,” “Breathe In” and the ultimate cry-in-the-shower song, “Let Go.” So, what’s cooler than being a musician with incredible sensibilities? Pioneering the future of music (of course!).
Rather than simply fusing musical genres, Imogen Heap is instead fusing wearable technology and music with her ingenious invention, Mi.Mu gloves. The gloves “put the power to create an entire musical composition right at [your] fingertips.” No keyboard or laptop required. It kind of sounds like the Wii of musical instruments.
She explained to CNN:
Being able to physicalize sounds as a musician seems like a dream come true, particularly for those artists who rely on machinery to perform their music. Rather than simply standing in front of your audience, engaged by a machine, these Mi.Mu gloves give artists the opportunity to conduct their own orchestra of sounds in a highly performative and beautiful way. Heap spoke to this idea citing her own experience, saying that “audience members will understand what I’m doing rather than fiddling around on a keyboard and mouse…I could just be doing my emails”.
Believe it or not, these gloves were born from Heap’s visit to MIT’s Media Lab back in 2009. Heap met engineer, Elly Jessop, who was creating musical gloves of her own. Inspired, Heap went about pursuing her Mi.Mu gloves and devised a kickass team of professionals to make her dream become a reality.
Nearly six years later, Mi.Mu gloves are well out of their conception stage and ready to change the world of music. Unsurprisingly, the gloves have garnered up strong a following of engineers, hackers and musicians alike. Even Ariana Grande got in on the action and posted her mind-bending experience with Mi.Mu gloves to Instagram last month.
I think we can all agree — Imogen Heap was nothing short of innovative prior to the Mi.Mu gloves, but this solidifies her ingenuity in the music world. So thank you, Imogen, for being the talented, pioneering and inspiring artist you are. Also, please make more videos of you using the Mi.Mu gloves.
Now, do yourself a favor and watch the magic that ensues with Imogen and the Mi.Mu gloves below:
Who else suddenly thinks they’re capable of creating music? Once they get the production costs down (a pair of gloves currently goes for $4,000), let’s all buy one for at-home use only. Sound good?
(Image via)
