A playback system that synchronizes the musical phrases with listener's respiration phases

We propose a novel sound presentation system that utilizes a listener's respiration (breath) information. The system uses sound data, targets of the respiration phase bounded to the sound data and the listener's respiration trace. In replaying the sound, the system attempts to change the replay speed to minimize the difference between the target of respiration phase and the observed (listener's) respiration phase. Thus, a listener using the system has more chances to listen to a specific phrase with a specific respiration phase. In an experiment, chromatic scale movements were presented with different replay strategies to evaluate the system. Although the participant did not know about the control system, they reported a difference in their arousal feeling. The results indicate that music presentation that follows the listener's respiration will have significant effect on the impression of sound, suggesting that we may extend the possibility of sound presentation.