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Virtual Choir Unites YouTube Songbirds in Digital Harmony

by Matthew Zuras on March 23, 2010 at 06:30 AM

We'll just generalize and say that everyone in the world who saw the YouTube 'We're All Fans' videos, which served to promote the 2010 Grammys, absolutely loved them. (Right?) Well, it's just that old democratizing Internet at it again, transforming those lone individuals who stare at webcams into the culture-makers of the next generation. And by that we mean to say that everyone likes being part of the YouTube crowd-sourced mob of content! Composer/conductor Eric Whitacre recognized this at some point last year, when he put together a virtual choir to sing a piece he'd composed for the project. Now, Whitacre's done it again, and the results are no less than brilliant.

Ignoring the cheesy, After-Effects-template backdrop, the video itself (after the break) is fantastic. We get to see mostly young people, of who knows what stripe, singing Latin earnestly into their webcams. You can't mock this kind of talent -- especially when compared to the standard YouTube fare of tweens lip-syncing age-inappropriate songs, or of peculiar talents like that of Maxine Swaby. (To that end, though, Whitacre himself does make some pretty exuberant faces while conducting. LOL.)

Whitacre posted a series of instructions on his blog in an attempt to recruit any Net denizens with the proper pipes. He posted a video of himself conducting the song, along to which each of the choristers would sing. Accepted candidates would record themselves singing and upload the videos to YouTube. From there, Whitacre knitted together each of the parts, merging an alto on one coast with a soprano from another. We love this! [From: Kottke.org]

Tags: crowdsourcing, EricWhitacre, music, top, viralvideo, VirtualChoir, youtube

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