JackTrip Labs Expands to Miami, Houston and Boston

Ragazzi Continuo is one of the groups using JackTrip to rehearse and perform together in real time. Photo Courtesy of Ragazzi Continuo

JackTrip Virtual Studios is now available in more than 50 markets worldwide, including recently added Miami, Houston, and Boston.

More details from JackTrip Virtual Studios (www.jacktrip.org):

PALO ALTO, CA (20 May 2021) — JackTrip Virtual Studio, an innovative platform developed by JackTrip Labs that enables users to play music together remotely, is now available in more than fifty regions around the world. The company has teamed up with cloud provider Amazon Web Service, which recently launched local zone service in Miami, Houston, and Boston, allowing user access in those regions to JackTrip’s fully managed audio servers where thousands of singers, choruses, bands, music teachers, and more currently use the game-changing technology to teach, create, and perform music together in real time from remote locations.

Combining the latest in audio and edge computing, JackTrip Virtual Studio has expanded beyond its initial use as a user-friendly platform for music groups to rehearse and perform together in real time while isolated. Says JackTrip Labs CEO Mike Dickey, “Our technology was originally developed during the pandemic as a platform for choirs, who had discovered they were unable to sing together over the internet due to the inherent audio lag time in meeting spaces like Zoom (as anyone who has tried to sing “Happy Birthday” has experienced). We are now finding that groups around the world are planning expanded use in the future, even after it is safe to assemble once again. Colleges, music teachers, professional musicians, theatre groups have discovered they can solve many logistic issues by utilizing JackTrip to augment in person classes, rehearsals, and even continue offering virtual performances.” The company continues to expand its geographic presence and expects JackTrip Virtual Studio to be available in over 100 regions by the end of 2022.

Unlike other virtual rehearsal/performance solutions, JackTrip Virtual Studio can be used simultaneously by groups of over 100 participants, and offers CD quality, lossless audio, while all other applications compress audio, significantly lowering the sound quality. The technology has captured attention of musicians around the world, who are discovering the myriad ways it can be used post-COVID, including collaborating with musicians that are far away, coordinating sessions with guest composers/ directors/conductors who might not be able to travel, enabling music lessons with others who are miles or even continents away, or hosting breakout rehearsals between sections or individual members.

“Working with JackTrip Virtual Studio has been life changing for us,” said Valérie Sainte-Agathe, Artistic Director of San Francisco Girls Chorus. “I know that this is the beginning of a new era, and the potential is unlimited. JackTrip is part of this technological evolution that will change the way we rehearse and teach, the way we create musical projects but will also add unlimited opportunities for the live performance world.”

Grammy Award-winning conductor and composer Eric Whitacre also champions the technology. Whitacre is widely considered to be the pioneer of Virtual Choirs, splicing together dozens and even hundreds of singers’ individual recordings into a single stirring performance. Over the last ten years, he has amassed hundreds of thousands of followers, with his virtual choir videos garnering millions of viewers. “JackTrip is amazing: it’s a game-changer,” said Whitacre. “It allows groups to make music over the internet with almost undetected latency. It’s as if I’m standing in a room with the singers I’m working with. I’m very excited about what JackTrip is doing and am going to be working more with the company.”

The technical challenge to virtual music collaboration is reducing delays in sound transmission to below 20-25 milliseconds (one way), a hurdle previously achievable only for very small groups (up to about 5 performers) who have advanced technology skills and expensive audio equipment. JackTrip Labs offers custom plug-and-play miniature computing devices using components from Raspberry Pi and HiFiBerry. These devices are powered by custom software developed by JackTrip Labs, built on top of the JackTrip Open Source audio platforms developed by Chris Chafe for Stanford’s Center for Computer Research in Music Acoustics (CCRMA). This hardware and software combination makes it easy for groups of any size to quickly get up and running with JackTrip, without requiring deep technology skills, and enable large groups (with hundreds of musicians) to achieve the real-time syncing across household internet connections.

JackTrip Virtual Studio can now be accessed in the following markets (with more to follow): Ashburn, Virginia; Boston, Massachusetts; Boydton, Virginia; Charleston, South Carolina; Cheyenne, Wyoming; Chicago, Illinois; Council Bluffs, Iowa; Des Moines, Iowa; Dublin, Ohio; Houston, Texas; Las Vegas, Nevada; Los Angeles, California; Miami, Florida; Portland, Oregon; Salt Lake City, Utah; San Antonio, Texas; San Francisco, California; Seattle, Washington; The Dalles, Oregon; Toronto, Ontario (Canada); Quebec City, Quebec (Canada); Montreal, Quebec (Canada); São Paulo, Brazil; London, England; Dublin, Ireland; Frankfurt, Germany; Paris, France; Milan, Italy; Stockholm, Sweden; Eemshaven, Netherlands; Zürich, Switzerland; Hamina, Finland; St. Ghislain, Belgium; Amsterdam, Netherlands; Cardiff, Wales; Oslo, Norway; Changhua County, Taiwan; Tokyo, Japan; Osaka, Japan; Seoul, South Korea; Mumbai, India; Jakarta, Indonesia; Pune, India; Busan, South Korea; Dubai, United Arab Emirates; Bahrain; Hong Kong; Singapore; Cape Town, South Africa; Johannesburg, South Africa; Sydney, Australia; Melbourne, Australia; and Canberra, Australia.

JackTrip Labs was spun out as an independent public-benefit corporation from the JackTrip Foundation, a collaboration between Stanford University’s Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics (CCRMA) and Silicon Valley software entrepreneurs. For more information about JackTrip Labs the public may visit JackTrip.org.