ok!choir online Pop Up - "Tender" by Blur

The COVID-19 pandemic might be keeping us from meeting together, but it can't stop us from singing together! Once a month, ok!choir and friends speed learn a whole 3-part-harmony song in one night, and then do a tiny performance for whoever we can convince to watch us. This month we did our speed learning from home, which meant friends from anywhere in the world could join in!
Friends of ok!choir from Europe, the UK, and even Australia learned one of 5 voice parts for Blur's "Tender" from our online tutorials, and then sent in videos of themselves singing their part. In some cases, people were too keen to stop at just one video, and learned two, three or even four of the parts! This video is the collaborative result of a multi-continental gang of music lovers getting together to share a little tenderness, at a time when community is particularly vital.
This video was recorded at home by the participants you see in the videos. The epic editing job was done by our very own megastar Chris Rieke. Tutorials and arranging were done by ok!choir Director Claire Coleman.
Like it? Check out the Pop Up videos on our channel for other speed-learned singalong fun! If you would like to hear about more Berlin-based and maybe even remote activities like this, please subscribe to our newsletter at: okchoir.com

[@doreensebastian3200]

What a huge mountain of work! I love it, thank you so much!!

[@okchoir]

thanks for being in it Doreen :)

[@Veleven]

It worked so well!!! Thanks so much for opening it up to the world!! Keen to do another one!

[@okchoir]

great! Thanks so much for being involved :)

[@pypik1770]

Fantastic! Next time it could be a whole globe earth singing !

[@okchoir]

that would be super cool!

[@okchoir]

but difficult for our video editor ;)

[@Volumio.]

Brilliant! Made my day happier! thanks

[@okchoir]

hooray! you're welcome :)

[@jori2006]

lovely idea with the scrolling of the videos at the beginning!

[@okchoir]

thanks! Our video editor is very clever :)

[@carolineriseborough3639]

What software do you use to do this? I'd love to have a go with our school children who are currently learning from home!

[@plastic__6640]

Caroline Riseborough same question

[@okchoir]

I hope this is not a downer: It was not just one software. It has been a mix of software products. The short answer is, we used Logic X, After Effects and Premiere. Long answer (about the execution): The videos were received within about a week (mostly wetransfer links). As soon as a video was received, the audio track of the video was imported to Logic X and assigned to the voice group and adjusted to be in sync and to have roughly the same volume level to match recordings of other participants. (The sum of all participants in a voice groups could also be levelled individually). For the video, Adobe After Effects and Premiere have been used. A template (or “Composition” to use After Effects’ terms) has been scripted, to adjust the correct aspect ratio of each clip. The In-Point could be set for each clip as well. Another scripted template has been written to create the full grid view (8x8) and the sliding grid view(5x5). These automatically scaled and positioned all videos according to their index in After Effects. If there are just 4 videos, it will scale and position it as a 2x2 grid, if another video is added it will adjust to a 3x3 grid (but with 4 empty black boxes…) Both, the (sliding) 5x5 and (static) 8x8 grids have been rendered. The highlighted videos have been manually added and animated to the rendered video of the static grid. Everything, the audio mix from Logic and the final rendered videos have been put together in Premiere.

[@carolineriseborough3639]

@@okchoir OMG, I really appreciate your attention to detail in replying but way over my head! You did a great job, your hard work shows.

[@okchoir]

@@carolineriseborough3639 hello, this is the tech-inept conductor Claire replying now. There are some apps around, maybe you've seen them already, that enable a kind of audiovisual live loop ... so you video yourself singing something and it appears as a frame in a grid, and then you can video yourself singing something else and it appears in another frame, know what I mean? There is one called Acapella which is quite user-friendly, and I think it has a collaborative function which might allow students to record on each others' vids. Not as fancy as amazing Chris's work, but definitely a practical option if you don't have access to an enthusiastic pro to do the hard bits for you like I do ;) Hope that's helpful!

[@carolineriseborough3639]

@@okchoir Thank you!!

[@lorenacipriano8594]

Come come come on🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏❤🇦🇷🇦🇷🇦🇷🇦🇷🇦🇷🇦🇷🇦🇷🇦🇷

[@waiata216]

Nice. Techinically a success. But the song is too long as it becomes repetitive and monotonous . Best to keep it too 2 and half minutes