country artist who can no longer sing officially releases a song with his cloned voice

Randy Travis suffered a stroke in 2013 and lost his voice. However, he has just released a new album with Warner Music, where he sings again thanks to artificial intelligence.

Randy Travis is truly an icon of country music in the United States. With numerous successes and a 40-year career behind him, he is one of the great artists of Nashville, the capital of country music and a true cradle for this traditional American genre. His deep, expressive and velvety voice is recognizable among thousands, but we have not heard it since the artist suffered a stroke in 2013. Several of his muscles are paralyzed, which now prevents him from speaking. correctly and obviously to sing.

However, it is his voice that we hear on a new song, which he wrote, arranged and produced. But it’s not him who sings, it’s software powered by artificial intelligence which has cloned his tone and his inflections. This is not the first time that someone has been blackmailed completely virtually. But this is the first time we’ve done it deliberately with the blessing of the artist, the producer and the record company.

A simple tool?

The first reactions from fans are very positive. For ten years, they hadn’t heard it, so there’s a lot of emotion. Most appreciate the quality of the song, but also the artist’s approach. Here they see the use of artificial intelligence as a simple tool to find one’s voice.

This could therefore give ideas to other singers in the same situation. We think, for example, of Céline Dion who has had difficulty singing since her illness. But we may also be opening Pandora’s box. We remember the controversy that Renaud triggered a few years ago, when his voice was “rearranged” to sound more accurate.

It will be necessary to separate those who will use these tools for purely artistic purposes from those who will have, above all, commercial aims. We think in particular of all those unpublished releases that we keep finding in drawers. Record labels and heirs own the rights to many deceased artists. The temptation is therefore great to resurrect them. If Randy Travis is the first to officially find his voice, he certainly won’t be the last.