More than ten years have passed since Randy Travis last recorded new music. However, on Friday (May 3), the country icon unveiled “Where That Came From,” a tender ballad showcasing his distinctive warm baritone and heartfelt lyrics.
In an upcoming interview with CBS News Sunday Morning’s Lee Cowan, scheduled to air this weekend, Travis’ longtime producer delves into the process of creating the track.
He reveals how the singer’s team utilized artificial intelligence following the debilitating stroke in 2013 that robbed the Grammy-winning star of his voice.
“It’s Randy Travis. Randy’s on the other side of the microphone … It’s still his vocal,” says Cris Lacy, co-chair/president of Warner Music Nashville in the interview. “There’s no reason he shouldn’t be able to make music … And to deprive him of that, if he still wants to do that, that’s unconscionable to me.”
Lacy acknowledges the prevailing concerns surrounding the negative aspects of AI. However, when the Travis team contemplated using AI to record “Where That Came From,” their primary goal was clear. “We would give Randy Travis his voice back,” Lacy asserts.
Following Travis’ stroke, doctors initially gave him a mere 2% chance of survival. The stroke not only left him paralyzed but also inflicted severe damage to the speech and language center of his brain, rendering it nearly irreparable.
Cowan also interviewed Randy Travis, 64, and his wife Mary for the segment, providing viewers with an exclusive behind-the-scenes moments.
Longtime producer Kyle Lehning led the effort to reconstruct the song, leveraging old audio tracks of Travis’ voice as a foundation, under the singer’s approval.
With assistance from another vocalist, a bespoke AI program seamlessly integrated Travis’ voice into the new recording.
Lehning meticulously shaped the AI-generated vocals, incorporating Travis’ input to ensure authenticity and resonance with his signature style.
“It’s not about how it sounds. It’s about how it feels,” Lehning says.“Him being here and him being able to be, you know, a vital part of the decision-making process makes all the difference to me.”
If he’s being honest, though, Lehning says when he first realized that the AI experiment was working it, “freaked me out… when I played it back it was like, ‘oh my!’ And I immediately thought, ‘this might work.’”
As Lehning delved deeper into the nuances of the song, he realized it required meticulous attention, necessitating a syllable-by-syllable approach for further refinement.
Cowan captured the poignant moment when Travis’ country music colleagues and family members listened to the song for the first time. Stepdaughter Cavanaugh Mauch reflected,
“It’s so strange to try and articulate all the emotions that flood your mind when you’re listening to it.”
Following Travis’ stroke, manager Tony Conway conceived The Music of Randy Travis tour, featuring the singer’s eight-piece band led by James Dupré, known for his role as Travis’ son in the 2015 film The Price.
The tour’s latest incarnation, the More Life tour, is currently underway, with the next performance scheduled for May 23 at The Paramount in Abilene, Texas.
Travis, inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 2016, has also released a trilogy of albums post-stroke.
This includes two volumes of covers, Influence Vol. 1: The Man I Am and Influence Vol. 2: The Man I Am, along with 2020’s Precious Memories (Worship & Faith), a compilation of worship songs recorded in February 2003 at the Calvary Assembly of God in Orlando.