ATU729 – Drake Music with Tim Yates

Hi, this is Tim Yates. I’m the research and innovation executive at Drake Music, and this is your Assistive Technology Update.

Hello and welcome to your Assistive Technology Update, a weekly dose of information that keeps you up to date on the latest developments in the field of technology designed to assist individuals with disabilities and special needs. I’m your host, Josh Anderson with the INDATA Project at Easterseals Crossroads in beautiful Indianapolis, Indiana. Welcome to episode 729 of Assistive Technology Update. It is scheduled to be released on May 16th, 2025. On today’s show, we are super excited to welcome Tim Yates to tell us all about Drake Music and all the things they’re doing to make music more accessible for anyone. We’re also excited to be joined by BridgingApps again with an app worth mentioning, and we also have a new story about a new wristband coming out to help individuals with elopement. Thank you so much for giving us a listen and let’s go ahead and get on with the show.

Listeners, our new story today comes to us from I95 Business and it’s titled New Assistive Technology to Help Identify Most Vulnerable Individuals in our Community Now Available for Pre-Orders. Story talks about a new piece of assistive technology called the InfoMate Wristband. It is made by a company called Zigglebee, that’s Z-I-G-G-L-E-B-E-E, and it says the wristband is a medical device that can assist with the identification, location, and information sharing on behalf of an individual wearing the wristband. It says that the InfoMate helps to break down communication barriers for those needing assistance and provide quick access to critical data that can reduce intervention time for first responders possibly saving lives. So the device is basically a wearable wristband specifically made for individuals with developmental disabilities, cognitive impairments, or psychiatric disabilities that are at heightened risk for elopement. On this wristband is a laser engraved QR code, and this is linked to that individual in a software program.

So basically what can happen is if the individual would elope or end up in some place where they don’t know, a first responder or someone else can scan this QR code and information is automatically sent to the caregiver and other individuals of that person’s location. It can provide the location details, the date, the time of the scan, and other information. There’s also a built-in compartment for an optional tracking accessory so that you can actually just know where the person is without having to scan the QR code. The software itself, which shares all the vital information and location details, you can change how much information is shared, when it’s shared, how it’s shared, and all those things in order to make it a little bit safer and more secure for folks. So a pretty cool device. It looks like pre-sales should have started here last month in April. We will put a link to this new story over in the show notes so that you can go and check out the InfoMate for yourself.

But we definitely know elopement can be a major issue, there’s some different tools out there for it, but this sounds like it’s a pretty easy-to-use device that would allow some independence because you don’t have to do the tracking all the time, but if something bad were to happen, someone scans that QR code and automatically that information would be shared with the caregiving team and other folks just so that that person’s location could be known. So, again, if you want to check out more about this, look over in our show notes. Listeners, our next INDATA full-day training will be coming up on May 22nd, 2025, and it’s titled Mobile Device Assistive Technology. This training will be 100% online, but you do have to register. I’ll put a link down to eastersealstech.com so that you can get to all of our full-day trainings and register for Mobile Device Assistive technology coming on May 22nd. Members of our team here at the Assistive Technology Program at Easterseals Crossroads will present on built-in technologies for iOS devices, Android devices, and other mobile technology. Will also be joined by our partners from InTRAC.

InTRAC at Indiana Relay not only sponsors the captions to the show, but also do a lot of them other amazing things related to helping individuals with mobile technology with communication. They’ll present on some of these programs as well as some amazing tools that are out there to help individuals access mobile technology. And we’re also very excited that we’ll be joined by our friends from BridgingApps, who you will hear later on this show as well. BridgingApps will be here to talk about their amazing search tool, how you can really look for some great different apps, also to talk about some of their favorite apps. So if you’re interested in learning more about Mobile Device Assistive Technology, do join us for our next INDATA full-day training on May 22nd, 2025 from 9:00 AM to 3:00 PM Eastern Time. Again, this online training does offer CEUs and is free to attend, but you must register before the training. We’ll put a link down in the show notes so that you can check it out for yourself. Listeners, next up on the show, we welcome back our friends from BridgingApps with an app worth mentioning.

This is Ale Gonzalez with BridgingApps, and this is an app worth mentioning. This week’s featured app is called TD Snap. TD Snap is a robust symbol-based augmentative and alternative communication, AAC app. It offers a large database of line-drawn icons and allows for incredible customization. This app benefits a wide range of clients, truly of all ages and abilities. From little ones picking animals out while singing Old MacDonald’s Farm to school-age kids using negation to say what they don’t want to teenagers reporting on their favorite topics in school to adults recovering from strokes or illnesses. TD Snap has one of the easiest to use bilingual options.

Once you create a bilingual profile, a single button in the same location on each page allows the user to switch back and forth between English and Spanish vocabularies. Some of a teacher’s or therapist’s best tools are included in TD Snap. Things like visual timers first-then boards, visual schedules and more can all be created in the app and linked to specific pages or activities. New notable features include larger font size, custom synthetic voices, easier access for Eyegaze users, and several other languages like Arabic, French, Brazilian, Portuguese, and Simplified Chinese. The only difference between the light and the paid version is the voice. The light version does not have any voice output. TD Snap is currently available for iOS devices and is free to download with optional in-app purchases. For more information on this app and others like it, visit bridgingapps.org.

Listeners, today, we are excited to learn all about Drake Music. Now, not to be confused with the music by the recording artist Drake, but Drake Music who are leaders in disability, technology, and music. Tim Yates is the research and innovation director for Drake Music and he’s here to tell us all about it. Tim, welcome to the show.

Hi, nice to be here. Great to be here.

Yeah, I’m excited to get into talking about Drake Music and all the great things that it can really do. But before we do that, could you tell our listeners a little bit about yourself?

Yeah. So as you said, I’m research innovation executive at Drake. I’m responsible for assistive music technology, instrument development, anything to do with assistive music tech. I, myself, am an instrument builder. I’m a musician and a sound artist. I build interactive sound installations, which is how I came into this job. And, yeah, so I am really fascinated and committed to making sure that everybody has an instrument that they can play. And however we manage to achieve that, that’s what we try and do.

Nice. That’s awesome. Well, I just have to elaborate on this. What is an interactive music installation?

So it depends a lot. So the stuff that I build varies a lot. So, for example, I build gongs out of large industrial circular saw blades. So [inaudible 00:08:45] diameter saw blades, I hang them and I find ways people to play them and I perform with them. And then I’m also, at the moment, doing a PhD using multichannel audio, building essentially room-sized instruments, so instruments that you stand right in the middle of. And I build different interfaces using massive levers, and buttons, and touch screens, and all sorts of different things for people to play them collectively as a group.

Oh, that is super, super cool. I feel like I could talk about that the whole time, but that’s not what we had you on. Tim, tell us what is Drake Music?

So we’re a UK-based charity. We’ve been going for over 30 years now. As you said, we work at the intersection of music, tech, and disability. We do lots of different kinds of work. So we work with disabled musicians on career development, we commission work, we put on shows and concerts, we also do things like run accessible ensembles, we run workshops, we work lots and lots of different ways across the country to open up music making for disabled musicians. And a big part of what we do is the research and innovation, which is about developing new instruments, adapting instruments, trying to make sure that everybody has an instrument that they can play.

That’s awesome. Can you give us an example of maybe some of the different kinds of tech or accommodations that you’ve been able to implement to help folks make music more accessible?

Sure. So, I mean, the range is enormously broad. Our [inaudible 00:10:10] is enormously broad. So we do a range of different work from developing bespoke from scratch instruments. So an example of that is an instrument called the Kellycaster that we developed with a musician called John Kelly. And it is an accessible guitar. He’s a punk singer and punk guitarist, and he isn’t able to play traditional guitar and wanted a guitar. So he came to us, I think, initially as part of a hackathon to develop a first prototype. And that’s gone on over the years to turn into a fully-functioning instrument for him that he now tours with professionally. He’s a professional musician using this instrument. So that’s the bespoke end of what we do.

We also work where there’s an instrument that has the potential to be accessible, even if it isn’t explicitly designed that way. We try and work with those companies. We try and work with those instruments to make those more available to people. So an example of that is we’ve been working with a company called Mi.Mu for, I guess, well over 10 years. They make gesture gloves. So actually developed in partnership with Imogen Heap… Well, for Imogen Heap, in fact. But they’re a pair of gloves that you wear and you can program hand gestures into them that can then make musical sounds. So those are super flexible because they respond to the individual’s gesture. So you record whatever your gesture is, and then you assign it to a sound. So what that means is that they can accommodate any gesture that someone might make, which obviously makes them very flexible in an accessibility context.

So that’s another example. We work with the London Philharmonic Orchestra on a program called OrchLab developing instruments in workshops with them, which is incredibly exciting. In general, our way of working is a co-design. So we’re always working with and led by a disabled musician to meet their needs, and we generally try and just follow that. So whatever’s going to be successful for that musician, that’s what we do, because we found that that is really the only way to end up with successful instruments. If you start with an idea for an instrument first, and then take it to disabled people later, often, it just doesn’t work. It doesn’t meet people’s needs and so on. And so we’re always trying to start from that beginning point, and then work outwards.

Yeah. So basically an individual with a disability comes to you, says, “Hey, I really want to play this instrument, make this kind of music, compose,” whatever it is they’re looking, and then you just work along with them throughout that whole phase.

Exactly right. Exactly right. And that can be the full range. We’ve worked on conducting patterns, we’ve worked on all sorts of different kinds of accessible guitars. I mean, the range is absolutely enormous. And so, yeah, so that’s the way that we always work.

Nice. I love that. So it’s not somebody coming to you and saying, “Hey, what can I do?” They’re coming to you and saying, “Hey, I want to do this,” and you’re helping them along that whole journey.

Exactly.

Awesome.

Exactly. That’s what we’re trying to do as much as possible.

Awesome. Tim, I’m sure you probably have some opinions on this one, but why do you think music is so important for folks with or without disabilities?

Well, I mean, that is a massive question.

I know. Sorry to pull that one out on you, but-

I mean, it just is. I’m a musician. I’ve always been a musician. I meet people who are musicians. I think you’re a musician, you just are. It’s fundamental to being a person, to being alive, to being somebody who can live a fulfilled life. And I think if you know that, you know it, and everything else is secondary to that. And also, if you’re a musician, if you need to make music and you’re not able to, that’s really damaging. It’s really hard and it really damages your quality of life. I just think it’s one of those activities that is so central to… Not everybody, but to huge percentage of the population that it almost goes without saying that it’s important. Everybody has the right to do it, has the ability to do it, has capacity to do it.

Oh, definitely. And, Tim, along those lines, what are some of the main barriers that you see in music access for individuals with disabilities?

Well, I mean, there are so many… Musical instruments are intrinsically complicated things. They are often really inaccessible because they’re designed with a very narrow set of physical coordination things that you need to be able to use them. They tend to be very expensive. The other thing with instruments is that they come along with a repertoire. So even if you have something that might be a successful instrument, it’s not necessarily something that has a lot of pieces written for it. It’s not something that can necessarily slot right into, say, an orchestra or a brass band or a jazz band or anything else. And so in order to make a successful instrument, there’s an entire network of things that need to happen. The instrument itself needs to be accessible, it needs to be available to the person who wants it, it has to be affordable for that person.

And then there has to be a context in which they can actually make the music that they want to make with it. And so part of the amazing and richness of music making are all of those components, the community and social aspect of it as well, but those can also be some of the things that make it extra tricky to make successful instruments. So basically, well, we’re music and accessible music tech specialists, obviously. So what we find is that, out there, there is no comprehensive resource about accessible music instruments and music tech. And also, there’s nowhere that people can go to try stuff, [inaudible 00:15:34] which is obviously a massive problem because the tech is expensive and people can’t [inaudible 00:15:40] buy it, and so on and so forth.

And also, we find that a lot of instruments get made in places like universities as part of PhDs and things like that, and then at the end of a PhD, they go in a cupboard and nobody ever sees them ever again. And so loads of really great instruments get made and they never have any impact. It happens all the time, and it’s nobody’s fault. It’s a structural problem. But, yeah. I mean, the thing is, if it’s there… What we also find is that people reinvent the wheel all the time. People are [inaudible 00:16:06] the same instrument over and over again because [inaudible 00:16:08] been done 15 times unsuccessfully before.

Oh, yeah.

The terrible idea that keeps getting repeated or whatever. So it’s also a research tool as well for those kinds of people to come along and see, even if it’s an instrument that isn’t necessarily totally successful, it’s still worth keeping and having because somebody else can come along and try it. So that’s where we feel we can make the most difference, is providing that resources, comprehensive, one of everything type resource. So basically our plan is to build a comprehensive collection of all of the accessible music instruments and tech that we can, put it in one physical location, but also put it online as much as possible, including where it’s bespoke source code and design files where people are prepared to share and that stuff. It is going to be as comprehensive a collection as possible, and it is going to be a playable collection. So we want people to be able to come and have a go on everything. One of the challenges that we’re going to have in a sense that musical instruments tend to be complicated as it gets, really.

Oh, for sure.

So managing that is going to be a massive challenge for us. So, I mean, we’re planning, obviously workshops, online materials and stuff. I mean, part of what we’re planning is to have performance spaces, and rehearsal spaces, and studios [inaudible 00:17:27] so that it has a life to it or come there anyway. And there’s music being made in the space because that’s part of the goal. But, yeah, that balance actually between people who can’t make it in person and people who can is going to be a really interesting one for us. We’re hoping that’s part of the thing is because that resource isn’t there at the moment, we feel like there’s loads of people… Because they don’t even know that it’s possible or such a thing, it’s actually really hard for people to get that way in. But, yeah, exactly. Hopefully, by building the resource, that makes everything easier for everybody.

For sure. And, yeah, there’s all kinds of other barriers out there. But, no, I think that’s really good. So getting back to Drake and talking about it a little bit, can you tell me a little bit about your Emergent Artists?

Yeah, so our Emergent Artists is a program of artists who essentially resident with us for a certain amount of time. We offer them career support. We try and help them to essentially further their careers to… We have workshops, and meetings, and networking events, and performances, and those kinds of things. So it’s a way for people to move their career on to the next level.

Awesome. Awesome. And you actually have the DMLab community. Can you tell me a little bit about the community?

Yeah, sure. So it’s been something that’s been going for well over 10 years now. That is a community focused around new instrument development… Accessible music tech and instrument development. So in that community, and we do this in lots of different ways, but that is disabled musicians and technologists coming together essentially sometimes to actually make new instruments, to talk about instruments, talk about practice, and talk about how you can successfully come up with solutions. Those two groups of people often don’t necessarily meet, there’s not an obvious place for them to meet, but when they do, there’s a lot of crossover between musicians and technologists, and a lot of sympathy and general mindset sharing among those two groups. And so when we bring them together, we often find that lots of new instruments appear, lots of new ideas, lots of new technology appears, and it’s a very, very constructive and positive way of going about doing this work.

Awesome. Awesome, awesome. Tim, you probably got a lot of these, but is there a story that really stands out for you? Maybe some of the things that you’ve been able to work on, someone you’ve been able to work with, or maybe, again, just a success story for Drake Music that maybe sticks out in your mind, or you always seem to go back to?

Well, I mean, John Kelly is a great example. His instrument, the Kellycaster, is a really big success. I mean, I think the thing that really sticks with me and my experience over time, and actually there’s a really good example. We did a hackathon with Sony in September last year where we brought musicians from the Paraorchestra in the UK together with some engineers from Sony from all over the world and academics. And we set them up in teams, and the hackathon lasted two days or three days.

And over the course of that, there were maybe five or six really good, really successful bits of technology and instruments that came out of that. The thing that always amazes me is how possible it is to come up with successful solutions. It’s tractable. These issues are tractable, and there are problems that can be solved, and it’s just always really exciting to see that process happen. And one of the things that I want to do is to make sure that that process keeps happening and that those kinds of instruments get out into the world more, which is one of the big barriers that happens at the moment.

Sure. Sure, sure. Just talking about that, what are you currently working on or very excited about?

Well, so the big project that we’re working on at the moment is a thing called the Accessible Musical Instrument Collection, which is a long-term project for us here at Drake. At the moment, there isn’t really anywhere a comprehensive resource of accessible instruments and accessible music tech, which means that if you want something and need something, there’s nowhere to go where you can try stuff. There’s no resource to give you a comprehensive overview of what is available and what might work. And what that means is that that’s just an enormous barrier for people to get started to figure out what works for them. Music tech can be very expensive, not the thing that you can necessarily just speculatively buy just in case it works. You need to find out that it definitely works before you invest your time and energy into it. And so the plan is to build a physical collection of as much of this stuff as we can get, along with an online collection so that that’s available to everybody everywhere.

And that will encompass commercial stuff, the stuff that you can buy in your average music shop that has accessibility uses, but also a lot of bespoke kit. The thing that we find is a lot of instruments get developed as one-offs. Perhaps people do it as part of a PhD or they get together with a particular musician and they make something amazing, but often those instruments never get beyond that one person or that very small group of people, even though we know that they could potentially benefit many, many people if they were available. And so part of what we’re going to do is to gather as many of those kinds of instruments together and also where people are prepared to share the IP, the source code, and the design files and those kinds of things so that people can make one for themselves in as easy a way as we can possibly manage, so that these kinds of instrument and all of this work that gets done can have the impact [inaudible 00:23:01] potential to have, at the moment, it just doesn’t have that impact.

That’d be great. That just opened up so many doors for so many folks, no matter where… Like you said, no matter where they are, whatever… Especially with the code, being able to print things on 3D printers for some other folks and other needs, I mean, no matter where you are in the world, you’d have access to those things. And then also, just a network of folks that could borrow, see, use, or just have access to those things could really make a huge difference for so many different individuals.

I mean, that’s exactly what we’re hoping. And that’s the thing. We’re at a really good moment in the sense that those kinds of technologies, laser-cutting, 3D printing, makerspaces, really are out there all over the place, and a lot of the stuff that gets developed uses precisely those tools. So if we can get the core information out there, and we hope that that will make an enormous difference, and then people will make new ones, they’ll adapt them, they’ll tweak them, they’ll make them better. And we hope that, over time, those instruments can really become incredibly successful and useful to people.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. And we can’t wait till you get that all in place and hear all about it. I know the challenges, and we talked a little bit before the interview about some of the challenges that come from that, but really hope that you get that up and going. Tim, do you have any advice maybe for individuals with disabilities who want to be more involved in music?

Advice? I mean, I suppose the top piece of advice, I suppose that it can be done. There are solutions out there and there are people who are doing it successfully. I suppose the advice would be to reach out to people who are already doing it. Our DMLab program, they’re online, they’re every couple of months, so you can come along to those. You can reach out to me, you can reach out to… There are lots of people out there who are doing this stuff, and everybody’s really keen to find more musicians and to make it more possible for more people to make music. So I think that’s probably the biggest piece of advice. And, yeah, keep going until you find the thing and, eventually, you will.

Nice. Nice. For our listeners who want to find out more about Drake Music and all these amazing things, what’s a good way for them to do that?

The best way, I suppose, is to go to our website, which is drakemusic.org. We’re also on Instagram, which is… We are drakemusicorg on Instagram and Twitter, I think, also drakemusicorg. Yeah, so that’s probably the best places to go.

Awesome. We’ll put all that information down in the show notes so that folks can easily go and find Drake Music, all the great things you guys, do get involved, and again, just keep up to date on all the latest happenings. Well, Tim, thank you so much for coming on today for telling us about Drake Music, for telling about the great things that you already do for getting folks together, getting the right people in the right places, the users, the makers, and everybody right there. And then the great things that you’re trying to do, just again, getting those tools into individuals’ hands that can really, really use it and open up just a whole new world of music, of writing, of just really great things. So thanks so much for everything you do and thanks for coming on the show.

That’s absolute pleasure. Thanks very much for having me.

Do you have a question about assistive technology? Do you have a suggestion for someone we should interview on Assistive Technology Update? If so, call our listener line at 317-721-7124. Send us an email at tech@eastersealscrossroads.org or shoot us a note on Twitter, @INDATAproject. Our captions and transcripts for the show are sponsored by the Indiana Telephone Relay Access Corporation or InTRAC. You can find out more about InTRAC at relayindiana.com. A special thanks to Nicole Prieto for scheduling our amazing guests and making a mess of my schedule. Today’s show was produced, edited, hosted, and fraught over by yours truly. The opinions expressed by our guests are their own and may or may not reflect those of the INDATA Project, Easterseals Crossroads, our supporting partners or this host. This was your Assistive Technology Update. I’m Josh Anderson with the INDATA Project at Easterseals Crossroads in beautiful Indianapolis, Indiana. We look forward to seeing you next time. Bye-bye.