Now in our 13th year of bringing you beautiful imagery from biomedical science every day

Search the archive of over 4000 images

The Ghost Orchestra
26 August 2017

The Ghost Orchestra

Gazing up at the iconic bells of Notre Dame Cathedral you hear music. You spin around looking for musicians, but there’s no-one there. The Ghost Orchestra isn’t supernatural in a spooky way, but uses a combination of acoustics and computer models to recreate the spectre of a French concert. Thousands of miles away in The USA, listeners are surrounded by the sound of 19th century opera "La Vierge" performed on Notre Dame’s 850th birthday – they can even move around the computerised cathedral using virtual reality headsets (pictured), experiencing the disembodied spatial music from different angles. Researchers plan to tailor the sensory experience to different ears, fine-tuning it for differently-abled listeners. The technology is also being used to investigate how visually-impaired people understand and remember unfamiliar places, perhaps making use of hidden creaks and echoes to build a mental picture of the architecture.

Written by John Ankers

Search The Archive

Submit An Image

Follow on Tumblr

Follow on Instagram

What is BPoD?

BPoD stands for Biomedical Picture of the Day. Managed by the MRC Laboratory of Medical Sciences until Jul 2023, it is now run independently by a dedicated team of scientists and writers. The website aims to engage everyone, young and old, in the wonders of biology, and its influence on medicine. The ever-growing archive of more than 4000 research images documents over a decade of progress. Explore the collection and see what you discover. Images are kindly provided for inclusion on this website through the generosity of scientists across the globe.

Read More

BPoD is also available in Catalan at www.bpod.cat with translations by the University of Valencia.