Porter Robinson has made himself into a Vocaloid called Po-uta
The official Yamaha Vocaloid 6 voicebank contains vocals in the style of those featured on his track Nurture
EDM producer Porter Robinson has released an official Yamaha VOCALOID 6 voicebank. The voicebank features vocals in the pitched-up style showcased in his track “Nurture” and is called Po-uta.
The virtual vocal voicebank is resembled, in VOCALOID tradition, by an anime-style avatar that looks a lot like Porter – or Po-uta – himself. The character, with the aide of AI-based voice synthesis technology, can conjure up lyrics in either English or Japanese.
Robinson announced the VOCALOID’s release via social media, where he linked to a demo song called Humansongs. The song was created using the Po-uta voicebank. Check out the track below:
In a tweet, the producer, whose work is heavily inspired by Japanese music, wrote: “man VOCALOID music changed my life and has been a key influence for like 10 years.
“i REALLY hope Vocaloid fans in particular love [Po-uta]
“it meant a lot to me when Sad Machine came out and i felt like , despite being an outsider of the scene, the VOCALOID community embraced it”
For the uninitiated, VOCALOID is a vocal synthesizer software developed by Yamaha. It enables users to create virtual singers by inputting melody and lyrics, and then use the software to manipulate the vocals to match the desired style and tone.
The most famous example of a VOCALOID is Hatsune Miku, a virtual popstar who was created using an early version of Yamaha’s VOCALOID software in 2007. Since then, she has gained a huge following among fans of anime and pop culture in Japan and around the world, sparking the term “VOCALOID music”.
Po-uta can only be used in the VOCALOID 6 Version 6.1 (or higher) software and not as a standalone product.
To purchase Po-uta, which is available for $108, head to vocaloid.com.
