- World Wide Vocaloid -

Music connects us all~

Prompt: Traveling an Idea or Theme or Concept Among and Across Worlds

For this Digital Archive, find and collect primary source examples related to a theme, an idea, phrase, song, visual symbol, or other cultural work related to something Core. Pick something that is important to you and think about how you can construct a meaningful narrative from one primary source to the next to the next.

❝ Globally circulating but locally distinctive. ❞

This was the phrase that Professor Wasserstrom used to describe how the communist movement changed as it spread across the world.

It strikes me how universal this is.

In this entry, we'll be taking a look at the globalization of my favorite thing in the world—

* drumrolls *

VOCALOID

A Deep-Dive into Vocaloid Culture Around the World

// What is Vocaloid?

Vocaloid is a program in which users can utilize a voicebank of pre-recorded "sound bite" syllables of human speech to produce synthesized singing. It's like if a voice was a musical instrument: you can tune it however you like and make it say whatever you want.

TLDR: it's a computer program that allows you to make singing vocals for your songs.

There are many other vocal synthesizer software similar to Vocaloid out there, including Synthesizer V (SynthV), UTAU, and CeVIO. Nowadays, Vocaloid is a catch-all term for all vocal synths, much like how Band-Aid became a synonym for bandages.

What makes these synthetic voices fun is that they are each represented by a mascot character (confusingly, also referred to as a Vocaloid). These characters have become beloved by fans, with musicians creating songs dedicated to them!

Machine Love by Jamie Paige, a song dedicated to the character Kasane Teto.

(Please give this a watch the MV is super gorgeous and heartfelt :)

A medley arrangement of popular songs featuring the character Hatsune Miku, celebrating her 10th anniversary.

Because of the total creative freedom that Vocaloid offers, it has become a thriving music scene with a community of artists and fans all around the world.

Let's take a look at how Vocaloid culture blends with local cultures!

🌎⠂⠄⠄⠂🎶🎤⠂⠄⠄⠂✨⠁⠂⠄⠄⠂‧₊˚⊹

// Vocaloid in Japan

Since Vocaloid originated in Japan, it is only fitting that we take a look at Vocaloid culture in Japan first :]

Magical Mirai 2024 Concert in Japan.

Vocaloids made by the company Crypton Future Media have had many collaborated concerts with traditional Japanese performing arts. On the left is a special concert collab with Kodo, a musical ensemble that performs traditional Japanese drums called taiko.

On the right, we have Cho Kabuki, a special stage performance combining Vocaloid with kabuki, a traditional Japanese theatre with a 400-year history.

Both of these unique shows are a great way to celebrate and spread the charm of Japanese culture, especially to generate interest among younger audiences.

Snow Miku has her own section in the New Chitose Airport called SNOWMIKU SKY TOWN.

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Snow Miku, a version of the Vocaloid Hatsune Miku, is an official ambassador for various events in Hokkaido. She has a bunny companion named Yukine who is based on the snow hare native to the region :3 🐇❄️❄️❄️

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Collab with Japanese airline HAC (Hokkaido Air System).

This is too iconic to not mention. Project Voltage is a song and art collaboration between Miku and Pokémon. Walk into any artist alley and I guarantee you will find AT LEAST a booth selling PokeMiku merch lol.

these are the best PokeMiku songs btw I don't make the rules

It's always so cool to see Vocaloid crossing with traditional and popular cultures. A bridge between traditional and modern.

Miku is truly a Japanese cultural icon <3

Vsinger Live 2017 Concert in China.

// Vocaloid in China

By sheer number alone, China is probably the biggest market of Vocaloid. It is the only country outside of Japan with annual Vocaloid concerts.

Nine-Nine Eighty-One (Journey to the West) by Wugui Sui and Xie Jiao Jiaozhu

Sun Quan The Emperor by Wugui Sui

These two absolutely iconic songs are, in my opinion, great examples of a genre of Chinese Vocaloid songs inspired by/based on Chinese mythology and ancient history. This style is called Gufeng, a modern interpretation of ancient style that can be used to describe just about anything—art, music, clothing, etc.

Gufeng Vocaloid songs and artworks typically have a great deal of research put into them. Although gufeng doesn't call for 100% historical accuracy, it is generally frowned upon by the Chinese Vocaloid community (and Chinese internet at large) to have misdrawn costumes or randomly combined elements from different eras.

Songs like "Sun Quan The Emperor" harken back to the idea of China as an enduring identity. As Professor Wasserstrom explained, although China didn’t always exist as one nation-state, there’s this emphasis in Chinese culture that China is an enduring ancient civilization. It aligns with the Chinese Communist Party's goal to establish the relatively new country, the People's Republic of China, as a direct successor/descendant to the thousand-year Chinese history.

One of the main visuals of Tianyi's Study Tour.

Art by

Xi You Jiuzhou, a song from the series Tianyi's Study Tour, is inspired by Chinese opera, a form of musical theatre in China with roots going back to the 12th century. (Specifically Kunqu, Peking, and Yue opera.)

Sang by the Vocaloid Luo Tianyi, it might surprise you to learn that this song is sponsored/endorsed by People's Daily, the official newspaper of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party. It aired on provincial television too.

⊹₊ ˚‧︵‿₊୨ 天依游学记 ୧₊‿︵‧ ˚ ₊⊹

(Tianyi's Study Tour)

// What's this project about?

Tianyi's Study Tour is a "picking up what was lost" project by CCTV, Bilibii, and Vsinger. It stars Vocaloid Luo Tianyi, featuring songs, art, and vlogs inspired by the cultures of ethnic minority groups in China.

The important thing to notice here is that this project is managed by none other than China Central Television (CCTV), the national television broadcaster of China. It answers directly to the Chinese government and CCP and is a key player in Chinese propaganda network.

State sponsored propgada. Yeah I think you can see the bias here.

Inner-Mongolia

arrangement of The Wind In The Sky, a Horqin Mongolian folk song

Yunnan–Guizhou

based on the Miao Goddess song "Yang Asha"

Tibet

with Lhamo theater elements

Xinjiang

includes iconic Xinjiang tempos and instruments

// So what value does the CCP see in Vocaloid?

Growing up in China, the phrase "56个民族" (56 ethnic groups) is basically ingrained into my brain through the osmosis of seeing it plastered EVERYWHERE in propaganda.

One of the core ideologies of the CCP is "56 ethnic groups, but one zhonghua minzu [singular Chinese national identity]." In this case, Vocaloid culture is used as a vessel to promote this ideology, especially towards the younger generation that is more in tune with internet culture. All in all, this project reflects the Chinese government's goal of promoting multi-culturalism (multi-ethnic, not necessarily multinational) and unity among the Chinese people.

I do want to note that this is seen as a positive thing by the Chinese Vocaloid community, as many find it a source of pride to see their favorite character given recognition, from the government no less :]

70 Years by Suda Rekeke

To top things off, here's a Vocaloid song commemorating the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China. The song is sung by the Vocaloid Yuezheng Ling and commissioned by the Communist Youth League of China.

I guess when you compare it to American celebrities making political endorsements and appearing in presidential campaign rallies, something like this isn't too unusual.

// Vocaloid On A Global Scale

Take a look at this "Where Are You From?" map from the Magical Mirai 2023 concert exhibit! Concert-goers can put a dot sticker indicating where they're from.

There are Vocaloid fans all across the globe 🌎✈️

(Image courtesy of this video showing a tour of the exhibit)

This is a perfect song for the occasion! Intergalactic Bound is the theme song for the 10th annivasry of MIKU EXPO, the world concert tour of Vocaloids under Crypton Future Media. This song is a collab between a Japanese and an American producer, Yunosuke and CircusP.

And I have to showoff that I was at the 2024 LA concert (and front-row seat babyyy)! I got to see this song performed live 🫶

A theme featured prominently in the both Professor Robertson and Professor Wasserstrom's lectures is globalization and local adaptation.

The perfect example of this in Voclaoid culture is the Every Country's Miku trend on Twitter, where artists redesign their own versions of Miku, incorporating their countries/regions' cultures and traditions.

Here are some of my favorite art from this trend :D

**The Twitter embeds might take a while to load!**

Fuwafuwa Miku @ UCI, photo by me

// Vocaloid in... UCI !?

Believe it or not, UCI also has a Vocaloid scene.

Anteater Miku

Anteater Miku drawn by me for Anteater Artists💜🎨🖌️She has been turned into a keychain and sticker!

Vocaloid Petrs

There are a lot of Vocaloid petrs. Here are some I've collected🫶

From top to bottom, left to right: @vibin_petr, @petr_sakura, @thepetrprincess, @petr_in_the_void, @matcha_petr

⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱ Reflection ⊰━━━━ ⋆₊⁺⋆

Digital Archive Entry Reflection

This digital archive entry has been my favorite to write and build! It is also the longest and most time-consuming, but I thoroughly enjoyed every second of it. I incorporated a lot of elements I've not used before, like highlights and dividers, and I'm really happy with how it turned out <333 I've been a fan of Vocaloid since 2017, and making this entry made me realize how big a part of my life it has been. Consider this page a shrine to Vocaloid culture🫶

My concept of worldbuilding has expanded since the beginning of Fall Quarter. Turns out, EVERYTHING is related to worldbuilding. Professor Robertson's lectures about communist worldbuilding on a personal level made me think about worldbuilding on a personal level in general. Looking at the digital archive websites of my classmates, I noticed a lot of them showcases a strong personality and gives me a good sense of the person behind the words on the screen. I think this reinforces my intial hypothesis—wait why did I make this sound scientific—of how artists put a part of themselves into their artwork. These personal websites we create are worldbuilding projects, and I'd consider that art :}

As for research project in Spring... to my own detriment, it's looking more and more like I'm gonna write something about Transformers😭Like don't get me wrong I like Transformers it's my new fixation and all that. But the fact that it's a fixation scares me because what if I lose interest or what if mixing it with academic stuff makes me lose interest and I have a ton of content to catch up on AHHHHHahdj. Anyways. Might write something about gender and philosophy (what it means to be sentient/human) and Transformers.

Winter Quarter Reflection

Honestly, the above reflection is a pretty apt description of what I've been up to this past quarter LOL. Listening to Vocaloid everyday and obsessing over Transformers🙋In all seriosuness though this Quarter has been rough. Lots of late nights because of my procrastination (ah, yes, the consequences of my own actions). Right now my grade is uhh not looking so hot in two classes so we'll see. At the moment I'm stressed about finals. Next quarter's gonna be my quarter trust🙏🙏🙏To end on a good note tho, despite the two humcore essays this quarter being a pain to write, I'm really happy with how both of them turned out! I think they're my best essays to date B)

Update (03/27/2025): I'M SO HAPPY I PASSED BOTH OF THOSE CLASSES (MATH 2D AND PHYSICS 7C) I DON'T NEED TO RETAKE THEM IN THE FUTURE YIPPEEEEEEEE🎉🎉🎉

Scrapped Idea

For this entry, we had three prompts to choose from. One of them was "Reflecting on the Quarter and Connections to Current Local and Global Social/Political Climate." While I ultimately didn't go through with this prompt, I did write down some ideas while brainstorming! It's a shame that those ideas would never see the light of day wow so dramatic, so I'm putting them here instead :D

- analysis of political shitposts, like people on twitter posing "can someone just do it already" insinuation someone shoukd kill elon musk actually reflects broader attitude towards the current poltical climate

- this genre of image/meme of a character saying "throw bricks at transphobe" but specifically bayverse aeo/tlk optimus version // the people that are upset by this; op is sometimes used by fascist rightwingers who think op would hate queer poeple but they are WRONG!!!! Queer fans are reclaiming him in a way with the meme and they're right // transphobes would insinutate violence at trans people but somehow a meme like this is a step too far - they crash out the moment trans people respond in kindness with the same level of violence through a shitty meme

- if im on this i might as well talk about nightshade tbh

Edit (04/12/25): actual foreshadowing lmao little did I know I would end up talking about nightshade, just in a different assignment -- my research project!! at least, that's the plan...

- being in fandoms populated by queer people sometimes made me forget how a lot of people are bigots and the world is very much not a Safe Space TM

- in 10 years people in ap gov are going to write an frq on jd vance edited

- the existence of subtle pride stickers - I have some myself; to signal yourself as a "safe space," if you know you know kind of deal (omg code breaking??) i rememebr i was talking to a friend and they were like "i would put a trans sticker on my laptop but I don't want to get hate crime" half jokingly. there's some truth to it. i put mine on my water bottle for kinda the same reason because it's less noticeable, plus it stays in my backpack most of the time.

References / Image Credits

Sources:

Wasserstrom, Robertson. "First Lecture 2/25/25." Humanities 1A, February 2025, University of California, Irvine.

Background Images:

CHIMERA album cover, art by Nou, Terada Tera, ryuuseee

Project Voltage

Tianyi's Study Tour, art by 川本日向雏/小雏饼干

Other Images:

Vocaloid Editor, Vocaloid voicebanks

Magical Mirai 2024 Hand in Hand (all Cryptonloids singing on stage together I used to pray for times like this)

Miku x Kodo, Cho Kabuki, SNOWMIKU SKY TOWN, Snow Miku x HAC, Vsinger Live 2017,

Header Image: Caldwell 9

Credit: NASA, ESA, and K. Stapelfeldt (Jet Propulsion Laboratory); Processing: Gladys Kober (NASA/Catholic University of America)

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