Voc-Xmas 2013 – Jingle Bells

With the voices of (alphabetically) Gakupo, GUMI, Iroha, Miki, Miku and Yukari, it's Jingle Bells as produced by my composer/producer friend neutrinoP, whose real name also happens to be Miki, and whose home town this is – Hunedoara in Romania – and where these scenes were shot (by someone called Pixelino) last Christmas (2012).

I think those responsible for the decorations in Hunedoara did a splendid job, much better than we tend to do in similar sized towns here in Britain. Perhaps our local council might like to watch this and have a bit of a think about their own offerings...

Music Girl Miku App in English

This is becoming available during this coming day (it's all about local timezones 'when' it will appear). See here for the details and link to this app for Apple's iOS; and below is the Japanese demo video: there isn't yet an English version of this.

Miku dances to music you play on your iPhone or iPad Touch, and you can interact with her in several ways, from getting her to watch your touch on the device to answering simple quiz questions. The more of this you do, the more goodies become available for download, such as different outfits.

It actually looks like fun, and I'd certainly get it if I had an Apple 'phone or tablet. There is a nominal cost of $4 (less than £3): it is essentially free anyway, just needing a small charge to cover the overseas admin...

Romania Vocalekt Concert

In fact, this edited together excerpts are from the second Vocalekt Visions concert held in Romania, at Nijikon 2012 on 3 November that year, only small parts of the first having been captured on video so not sufficient to make something like this. They get a remarkable thousand or so attendees to these events, no doubt helped by Vokalekt's neutrinoP coming from that country and promoting them locally.

I was particularly taken with the Yuzuki Yukari model, which is spectacular: this was created by neutrinoP (who is a versatile fellow) from a base model by one KumaMMD, of whom I hadn't previously heard. Between them, they have produced something quite special, I think.

Several of the featured songs will be familiar to those who follow these things avidly (John raises his hand at this point), and others will be new, including Overload and the Romanian Promisiuni. It's a good forty minutes, despite not having English captioning/subtitles, and is available in High Definition, selectable in the usual way from the cog icon at the base of the YouTube player once started...

Hallelujah Chorus

"This is the day that the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad in it" (Dr Robert Schuller, Crystal Cathedral)

This version of Handel's world-famous Hallelujah Chorus works very well overall, with the chorus being provided by nine Vocaloid voices (three male, six female), none of whom had an English voicebank at the time this was produced, which was a little over three years ago as I write this.

The fellas are Gakupo, Len and Big Al, and the ladies are Miku, Rin, Luka, GUMI, Miki and Sonika (a Vocaloid from Zero-G of whom I had been essentially unaware until now), and I think they do a credible job – though there are a very few occasions when the English subtitling is helpful. It's a superb uplifting way to go into a Sunday – or any other day, but it rightly starts here, on Sunday..

Handel would approve...

Parallel World

Just up at YouTube is this from neutrinoP and tempo-P – the Vocalekt Visions composing duo. Parallel World features four Vocaloid voices: GUMI (Megpoid), Miku, Miki and Rin, and the video has (almost perfect!) English subtitles too ...