A high-tech baton that allows blind musicians to follow a conductor for the first time has been developed, paving the way for them to join professional mainstream orchestras.

The baton, loaded with microchips, transmits the precise movements of the conductor via wireless signals to electronic wearable devices on the blind or visually-impaired musicians’ wrists or ankles.

The devices’ sensors translate the signals into vibrations and buzzes which the musicians feel, enabling them to pick up not only the beat but also the movement of the conductor’s baton in the air.

“It emulates what a sighted musician sees,” said conductor Charles Hazlewood who successfully trialled the technology with a dozen blind and sighted musicians at a performance of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony and a new work by a South Korean composer.