Frisson – a brief moment of emotional excitement

Have you ever experienced chills when listening to music? Does certain songs cause orgasmic spasms to flow down your spine during  specific riffs? Scientists call this chilling effect “Musical Frisson”. Scientists estimate that only 25-50% of people in the world can actually experience musical frisson. I believe musical frisson is an effect on the human body that everyone should be able to feel, therefore the goal of the Musical Frisson Inducer is to increase the percentage of people who experience musical frisson.

To help make this possible, inside the capsule contains five 8Ω amplified speakers positioned to simulate 3D Audio Effects including 2 Subwoofers for vibrational effects as well. Certain effects are known to stimulate the effects of musical frisson such as:

• Abrupt Volume Change
• Panning
• Climatic Build Up
• Sudden Change in Tempo

There are many more effects, but the main effects that were used on the audio side of my project involved mainly Panning, Volume Change, Climatic Build Up, and High and Low Frequency Filtering. Using music editing software to create these effects, I chose Kid Cudi’s “Copernicus Landing”, in hopes that a more abstract song would not allow internal negative or positive feelings to be elicited.

Along with the Audio Effects were Visual Effects to also induce a state of serenity. Synced with the music element, the hope was to help induce Musical Frisson by including other senses with the experience. By keeping the visual to a minimum of a light show rather than a display of an equalizer, it doesn’t draw attention from the music, however it aims at stimulating the receptors in our brain to be more open to the Audio Element of the this project.