Randy Travis Sings New Song Through AI, Years After Stroke Took His Voice

Country music legend Randy Travis, who’s largely been unable to speak or sing since a devastating 2013 stroke, is crooning again with help from artificial intelligence.

On Friday, Travis released a new studio-recorded song called “Where That Came From,” made using an AI version of his voice trained with past audio tracks. It’s his first new song since a stroke left him with severe aphasia, a disorder caused by damage to the side of the brain that controls language.

“Eleven years ago I never thought I would be able to have a hand in music production of any kind, but by God’s grace and the support of family, friends, fellow artists and fans, I’m able to create the music I so dearly love,” Travis shared in a Thursday Facebook post accompanying a teaser video for the tune, which you can hear below.

The song demonstrates AI’s power to unlock creative expression for people living with disabilities. Last month, Steve Gleason, a football hero paralyzed by ALS, displayed a series of vibrant drawings he made with AI trained on art he made prior to his diagnosis.

Travis’ new song has a smooth, easy-listening vibe. “She had eyes like diamonds and they caught the light,” the Country Music Hall of Famer sings. “Ah but they were dark and deeper than the night. But when she smiles out came the sun, and there ain’t no more where that came from.”

Artists have responded to generative AI both with enthusiasm about the tools’ creative potential and concern it will steal their work to train datasets—or possibly alter the very nature of creativity itself. But Travis’ fans have overwhelmingly met the song with joy, praise and appreciation.

“To hear his voice again is a miracle,” one wrote in the YouTube comments section for the music video. “What a beautiful song!” Wrote another, “It doesn’t matter if it’s AI, if it’s voice cloning, etc. This is Randy’s voice in one form or another; you can hear the authenticity regardless of how this was created and I love it.”

Travis, who turns 66 on May 4, rose to prominence in the 1980s with his best-selling debut album Storms of Life. He went platinum with his first album was the first debuting country artist to go multi-platinum.

Travis “became the de facto leader of a handful of tradition-minded artists who dramatically changed the course of country music’s evolution beginning in 1986,” reads a Country Music Hall of Fame’s description of the artist. “Travis’ understated traditional vocal twang and square-jawed sex appeal endeared him both to hard-country loyalists and to millions of fans beyond country’s core boundaries.”

Travis recorded “Where That Came From” with record producer Kyle Lehning, his longtime collaborator, and Warner Music Nashville.

“There’s just so much chatter about all the negative sides of AI,” Cris Lacy, co-chair and president of Warner Music Nashville, told CBS News Sunday Morning. “We started with this concept of, ‘What would AI… look like for us?’” The first thing that sprung to mind, according to Lacy: “We would give Randy Travis his voice back.”