Virtual Choir Software
Albina Hickel
The Virtual Choir is a global phenomenon, creating a user-generated choir that brings together singers from around the world and their love of music in a new way through the use of technology. Singers record and upload their videos from locations all over the world. Each one of the videos is then synchronised and combined into one single performance to create the Virtual Choir.
Thousands of singers from 120 countries took part in Virtual Choir 5: Deep Field to feature in the epic new film celebrating the greatest discovery of the Hubble Space Telescope: the Deep Field images.
Launched at the Lincoln Center, New York in a live online webcast and revealed on YouTube in April 2012; then mastered for bespoke audio-visual installations. It received an amazing 3,746 videos from 73 countries.
Ten years ago we created the Virtual Choir with a simple question: is it possible to make beautiful music together, no matter how far apart we are? After multiple virtual choir projects featuring over 20,000 singers from 124 different countries, the answer is a resounding yes.
The immediate effect of social distancing and eLearning was a loss of our concerts and festivals. Like many of you, I felt angry, disappointed, and sad. The loss of musical collaboration towards a celebratory end sent me through waves of grief. In the grand scheme of things, a cancelled concert or festival is not critical, but I think it is still important to acknowledge our emotions before we try to lead our students through them. This year we have been working to increase the self- and social-awareness of our students by implementing a Social-Emotional Learning curriculum through the choral music education classroom. This level of navigating emotion has required every ounce of the skills we have tried to build this year, for students and teachers alike.
Our students have lost their routines, their socialization, the events they have dreamed of for years. Some are reeling. They miss their friends. They miss the daily escape of the choir room. They wanted to perform as much as we wanted them to perform. But some are relieved. The rigid bell schedule is gone. They get to avoid that kid they do not get along with. They can just sing the music they want to, when they want. They do not have to go on that stage that can be so anxiety-producing.
The students realized that there are challenges involved in the creation of a virtual choir that go beyond the polished videos appearing on social media. The social and emotional ramifications were articulated more prevalently by the students than the technological challenges.
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A virtual choir, online choir or home choir is a choir whose members do not meet physically but who work together online from separate places. Some choirs just sing for the joy of the shared experience, while others record their parts alone and send their digital recordings, sometimes including video, to be collated into a choral performance. There may be a series of rehearsals which singers can watch online, and their performance recordings may be made while watching a video of the conductor, and in some cases listening to a backing track, to ensure unanimity of timing. The worldwide COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 inspired a large growth in the number of virtual choirs, although the idea was not new.
Online choirs can make singing accessible to would-be choristers who are unable to joining 'in-person' or 'face-to-face' choirs due to issues such as disability, caring responsibilities, geographical restrictions, lack of local opportunities, cost, or a lack of confidence to perform or audition in front of others. For example those who use hearing aids may find it difficult to take part in a 'same-room' choir due to interference from multiple sources of sound, but could benefit from the more direct digital sound of an online choir rehearsal and/or the text-based chat offered by some online choirs.[1]
American composer and conductor Eric Whitacre has led six iterations of his Virtual Choir, starting in 2009. He was inspired by a young singer Britlin Losee who contacted him after posting a YouTube recording of herself singing the soprano part of his work Sleep. In his first version, 185 singers from 12 countries sang his Lux Aurumque, watching a video of him conducting.[2][3] By 2020, over 20,000 singers from 124 countries had participated in the choir, and Whitacre launched his Virtual Choir 6 to sing a new work "Sing Gently".[4] 17,572 people in 129 countries had contributed their recordings by the closing date in May 2020.[5]
ChoirCast was set up as Choirantine in April 2020[7] by Bristol-based singing teacher Eliza Fyfe, kick-starting with their debut "Bohemian Rhapsody" which featured Gareth Malone. ChoirCast have been producing monthly videos ever since, edited by Martin Elsbury, editor of Netflix documentary David Attenborough: A Life on Our Planet. They usually feature a band, with the sound mixed by music producers Daniel Edney, Kristian Bressington and Charles Grimsdale and popular song arrangements written by Eliza. This particular choir focuses on smaller numbers to enable singers to stand out more, even including soloists, yet still featuring people from all around the world.[8]
The Collective Virtual Choir was set up in March 2020 by Simon Lubkowski, a Director of Music at a college in England.[9][10] A prominent Barbershop singer and leader of several community based choirs in Leicestershire, Simon leads the choir from his garden shed studio along with his entirely voluntary Music Team who are based in the UK, Europe, USA, Canada and Australia. The choir stages daily rehearsals with sessions timed to suit different time zones, since the choir has almost 4,000 registered participants from 66 countries, alongside providing technical support and social events and activities via the medium of Zoom. The Collective produced its first song, White Cliffs of Dover, on 17 April 2020. Since then it has produced 23 further songs and a 27-song Christmas Show (The Collective and Friends at Christmas). The Collective is free to join and participate in. It runs daily rehearsals and, in addition, offers full technical support to its singers as well as social events/activities all via the medium of Zoom. The Collective Virtual Choir plans a Harmony College weekend (Free for registered singers), a Double CD Album and a Collective Live event in 2022.
In Australia, Couch Choir evolved from the pre-existing face-to-face Pub Choir with an "ongoing mission to bring strangers together for a sing-song", according to The Canberra Times.[11] Since inception in March 2020, Couch Choir has chalked up millions of views with over 10,000 singers lending their voices to songs by Stevie Wonder, The Carpenters and David Bowie. Their July 2020 video of The Killers "All These Things That I've Done" included 1,534 contributions from people in 40 countries.,[11] and was shared by The Killers across social media. Couch Choir's videos have been featured on BBC News, Australian Story and Today.[citation needed]
Gareth Malone launched The Great British Home Chorus on Monday 23 March 2020 on YouTube[12] and conducted 50 half-hour rehearsals (Monday-Friday with a "half term" break) up to Friday 12 June, moving thereafter to weekly rehearsals. He worked from his garden studio, with technical assistance from Decca Record.[13] The choir produced a CD including the voices of 11,000 singers, featuring the songs "You Are My Sunshine", Duran Duran's "Ordinary World", Keane's "Somewhere Only We Know" and Elton John's "I'm Still Standing", accompanied by members of the London Symphony Orchestra.[14]
The Sofa Singers[31] was founded by choir leader and performer James Sills in March 2020, with global members meeting twice a week on Zoom to sing together. The music covered is primarily pop and motown classics from the 1960s to more contemporary hits. Each session finishes with an open mic opportunity, where singers can share with others around the world, for example music, poetry, arts, craft, or their pets. In May 2020, James was awarded a Points Of Light award in recognition of his work to help combat feelings of isolation during the pandemic through his work with the Sofa Singers.
The Stay at Home Choir[32] was founded in mid March 2020 by conductor Tori Longdon and baritone Jamie Wright. During the pandemic, the Choir worked recorded projects with professional musicians including The King's Singers, The Sixteen, The Swingles, Marin Alsop, John Rutter, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Voces8 and Christopher Tin.[33] Its largest and one of its longest projects to date, in collaboration with Classic FM, was Karl Jenkins's The Armed Man, which premiered in August 2020.[34][35] Stay At Home Choir received one of the first Royal Philharmonic Society Awards for Inspiration in November 2020.[36]
The Rexburg Children's Choir in Rexburg, Idaho, United States, featured on NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt with their virtual performance of For Unto Us a Child is Born. Each of the 100 singers, aged 10 to 17, came individually to a central location to sing, conducted by director Ben Watson, in front of a green screen, and these films were combined to show the whole choir apparently singing together. Inside Edition highlighted the virtual choral performance as part of their national broadcast the following day.[39][40][41][42]
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