World Braille Day, music in the spotlight

Black, white, eighth-note or round, a musical score printed in black and white remains mute to a person who can’t see.

How can a blind music lover get started in reading and practicing this art form? Braille! A tactile writing system with raised dots, in which every letter, number and even every musical, mathematical and scientific symbol is represented by a combination of six dots. It gives blind and partially-sighted people access to the same books and magazines as those intended for visual reading…

We owe the emergence of this system to Louis Braille, who invented it in 1829. Since 2001, World Braille Day has paid tribute to the inventor of this alphabet, who was born on January 4, 1809. Its aim is to raise public awareness of the handicap suffered by the blind, and to remind people of the existence of Braille.

We’d like to take this opportunity to (re)introduce you to our collection of musical scores in Braille, donated by the Centre pédagogique pour élèves handicapés de la vue (CPHV) in Lausanne.

Nearly 2,600 titles are available. Find them in our Renouvaud search tool. Are you looking for a particular composer? Debussy, for example? Type “Debussy” in the search field, choose the “In library” search, launch it and then filter it by “Document type : Braille scores”. Enjoy your discovery!

Nobuyuki Tsujii, talented Japanese pianist blind from birth.