MIT alumni/ae got to know Boston Pops conductor Keith Lockhart on a more intimate level at Tech Night at the Pops on Thursday, June 4. Mr. Lockhart wore a Media Lab-developed jacket with sensors that turned the art of his conducting into performance art of a different sort. Sensors recorded the position of his elbows, wrists, shoulders, neck and waist, as well as his heart rate, respiration and other vital signs, then displayed them graphically on a giant screen above the orchestra for all to see (above and top right). The "Conductors Jacket" was developed by graduate student Jennifer Healey; the real-time graphical display, by graduate student Jocelyn Riseberg. The evening also featured Professor Thomas DeFrantz (right) in the rarely performed Tap Dance Concerto, by American composer Morton Gould.
A version of this article appeared in MIT Tech Talk on June 10, 1998.
