interpreting a song for you in

traditional American Sign Language. Now

here's the same song but it's in a

specialized version of American Sign

Language just for music. You might

actually recognize this riff it's from

"Don't Wanna Fight" by Alabama Shakes. So

which one connects you more with the

music? Hi I'm Amber Galloway Gallego. She's

interpreted concerts in ASL for

literally every artist view you could think of.

Adele, Kendrick Lamar, Drake. I think it's

up to 400 a little bit over 400 now.

Amber is a part of a growing number of

ASL interpreters that work to translate a hearing centric music world into a

visual one. I want to introduce you to

three very talented women please welcome

Holly Maniatty. That's Holly.

and Jo Rose Benfield and Amber Galloway Gallego each of these

women is a nationally certified sign

language interpreter and even more

importantly they have fun with it. ASL,

American Sign Language is fairly new it

was only technically like really

approved in the early 1960s saying yes

it's an official language. It has its own

rules for grammar and syntax and there

are five parameters that everyone has to

follow. The first is hand shape. Now this

is a sign for mom and this is a sign

for dad. The hand shape in both cases has

to look like this. You have palm

orientation, so your palm can't be facing

down or up. And then there's location. The

hand has to be placed on the chin for

mom and the forehead for dad. And then

you have movement. The fingers have to

wiggle or they can bounce. And finally

there are the nonmanual markers. These

nonmanual markers are vital in

conveying instrumental sounds. That's

going to be the expression here, but also

the expression that happens on your body

right like usually it's like mom but

it's like mah, dah.

The deaf community is made up of a

diverse group of people who have a wide

range of residual hearing. Some might be

able to hear lower frequencies like

drums or bass but not higher frequencies

like vocals or guitars. And of course,

everyone can feel the vibrations of

music especially at live events. So what

the interpreters have done for many

years is they've ignored the sounds and

solely focused on the English. So this is a

sign for music right like this can you see it?

So you'll hear music and this is what the

interpret does

"music"

and that's all they

do and that's what they have been doing

for years and years and years. So here's how

Amber solved this problem. I thought about

basses and how thick they sound right?

00:03:04,190 --> 00:03:06,840 And when there's a fat person they'll be

like this like they'll show a person

like this but they do this. You have to do

this to show thickness and density

right so you'll see my lower sounds are

lower put here and then my higher sounds

go up and you'll see my facials move to that

so I'm like wow like the wow wow

wow so you'll see that bow wow and then

I show this to show the waviness. There's

actually footage of her doing this exact

thing on stage with the Red Hot Chili

Peppers

if we merely show the sign for music

then we are doing an injustice as an

interpreter.

So after listening to the

beat and how their their tonality is and

all the instruments then what I do is I

break it down from English to ASL. So

rhyming, metaphor, and wordplay are an

intrinsic part of lyrical music

especially hip-hop so how do you

translate that to a visual form of

communication? Let's look at Eminem's "The

Monster" featuring Rihanna. Ok where he

says "in the draft turn nothing into

something still can make that straw into

gold chump I will spin Rumpelstiltskin

in a haystack" Rumpelstiltskin is the

fairy tale about straw turning into gold.

So that part is where I take it and I

take it the rhymes out of my pocket and

I write and then I show it like that

like it's like I'm expressing it that's

how you like express and then I show it

become a gold record and then I say "poom"

where he says "chump" where it's like "I beat

you." Of course this all has to happen at

the rate in which Eminem raps.

"It's payback Russell Wilson

Falling way back in the draft

Turn nothing into something

still can make that,

straw into gold chump,

I will spin Rumpelstiltskin in a haystack.

You can also combine two

signs in ASL to convey wordplay. Amber

did this with Future's "F*ck Ups Some

Commas"

Fuck up some commas let's fuck up some commas.

Let's fuck up some commas

This is a sign for like commas like

showing the number but I did it with the

"fuck up" with "fuck" so i did that.

So you might not be able to rhyme in ASL but

you can certainly get the cleverness

across. You have to truncate your signs

to be able to keep up with the beat to

make sure it's looking like rap. Since

the enactment of the Americans with

Disabilities Act in 1990 concert venues

have been required to provide

interpreters for deaf attendees.

When asking to get

services that is the biggest

barrier that we have in the world today.

It's vitally important that concert

venues hire interpreters who understand

the emotional power of music. Like for

example like the national anthem like if

you were to interpret Whitney Houston's

is going to be drastically different

than like Barbra Streisand's right? And

we can't just say I'm standardizing the

sign and this is what I'm going to

always sign. Like for the sign "brave"

right you do "brave" and I'll see some

people just go through the motions of

the actual signs and then they'll do

"brave" and Whitney Houston still singing

you know going through her long-ass

"brave."

That's the whole reason to go to music

events is to be a part of this experience

and forget about the rest of the world

and be there in that moment and so many

times deaf people are not allowed that

experience because we as hearing people

choose to say no