Some info about Spanish voicebank's design

As I've said before, some time ago after releasing Suu's first voicebank, I wanted to listen him singing in my native language: Spanish, and that's why he will have a voice library for this language soon. However, this is not only a matter of "I wanna listen the anime guy with my voice sing a song I can understand".

One of the things I like about UTAU is it has a rich and mixed culture, and I'm not only talking about content creators & fans, but also about voice library creators; voicebanks made by people from different countries around the globe and different social, ethnic, linguistical and minority groups, etc... There's also voice libraries made for foreign languages besides English and Japanese! And this is a beautiful consequence of UTAU itself being free software as in "free speech", not only as in "free beer", just like GNU's classic analogy. Even a class worker guy from a third-world post-apocalyptic Latinoamerican country like me can make a voice library with cheap and limited resources, something many of us wouldn't be able to make if it weren't for this digital invention. 

Most UTAU creators from foreign cultures & countries make their own voice libraries capable of singing in their native languages, and I think that's beautiful, I wanted to do this too; it's just like a cultural symbol. That was another reason that motivated me to develop an Spanish voicebank. 

While I was making sketches and drafts for the conceptual art of this voicebank, I wanted to make sure to make a design that had elements from not only my country's culture, but also my hometown's, while still taking inspiration from Suu's main design & concept.

 

I usually describe Suu as a melancholic and sensitive guy. His favorite music genres are post-punk, alternative rock and shoegaze. However, his main design aims to express his individuality and his wishes to be recognized by everybody else as a musician instead of focusing on externalizing his personality and nihilistic point of views about life and society. So... I decided to do the opposite for the design of his Spanish voicebank! I wanted to make a design that focuses on actually externalizing those traits. 

This concept takes inspiration from 80s Venezuelan rock; a peak era where a lot of bands emerged and most of them would sing about existential, philosophical, political and mature themes. Some bands were also influenced by post-punk and would sing about feelings of alienation, loneliness and melancholy.

   

 

 

This time, Suu not only has a whole new design, but also takes the role of a complete different character with a different story: Saúl Ibarra, a Venezuelan rock musician from the 80s who moved from his small hometown to the big capital city in the search of opportunities.

 

Saúl is meant to be a derivative character and the 'image' of Suu's Spanish voicebank. However, you're not obligated to link this character or this name to the voicebank. This voice library will still be named "Suu Isshiki_ES", while "Saúl Ibarra" will refer to the character itself  (for example: Hatsune Miku V4 Chinese character's name being "Chuyin Weilai"). Name him whatever you wish, either one is fine.

 

Full standing art and other visuals will be revealed once the full voicebank is finally released (January 3rd 2027) along with a demo reel video. Please look forward to it!!

 

- Jakisalt