Ten years ago, a teenage fan recorded herself singing the soprano line from one of Eric Whitacre’s choral pieces and posted it on YouTube. And it gave composer-conductor Whitacre an idea: What if he could get several singers to record themselves in their rooms, doing one of his pieces in the same tempo and key, then stitch the videos together and make a virtual choir?
“This virtual choir, Virtual Choir 6, has 17,562 different singers from 129 countries,” he says. “When I look at the numbers and, more so when I look at the faces of the people from around the world, I’m just stunned.”
