Silicon Valley's Jacktrip Labs Forms Partnership With World's Largest Music Publisher Hal Leonard

JackTrip Labs, the Silicon Valley-based remote music making platform, announced it has formed a partnership with Hal Leonard, the world's largest print music publisher and leader in digital music technology. Hal Leonard will serve as the exclusive distributor in the United States and Canada for JackTrip's plug-and-play devices which allow easy connection for musicians in real time using home internet connections.

The devices create an easy one-step interface with JackTrip Virtual Studio, an innovative platform developed by JackTrip Labs during the Coronavirus pandemic to enable users to sing or play music together remotely, eliminating the inherent audio lag time in meeting spaces like Zoom (which anyone who has tried to sing "Happy Birthday" has experienced).

Thousands of users in more than 50 regions worldwide, including singers, choruses, bands, music teachers, and more, currently use the virtual platform to teach, create, and perform music together from remote locations. To learn more about the partnership the public may visit jacktrip.org.

"We are excited to team up with Hal Leonard, a venerated titan in the music industry," said Mike Dickey, CEO of JackTrip Labs. "This partnership will help us continue to connect musicians over the internet and expand this thriving community of users who are collaborating remotely worldwide."

"Hal Leonard continues to lead the field, providing the most cutting edge digital music technology to its customers," said Brad Smith, Vice President of MI Products at Hal Leonard. "The groundbreaking devices by JackTrip Labs pave the way for the future of music creation and music education, facilitating music making in real-time without boundaries. "

JackTrip Labs' Virtual Studio Device provides an easy one-step path to making music with remote partners online in real time using home internet connections, offering excellent quality audio and a hardware latency of only about 1 millisecond (compared to most sound cards which lag at 10s to 100s of milliseconds). The technology utilizes the latest breakthroughs in cloud-based computing to transmit uncompressed, CD quality (48kHz, lossless) audio at ultra-low latency, giving groups of online users an audio experience that mirrors being in the same room. No laptop or desktop is required, the device includes all necessary software.

The technical challenge to virtual music 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) with advanced technology skills and expensive audio equipment. JackTrip Labs' online platform and hardware devices allow groups of any size to quickly get up and running, without requiring deep technology skills, and enable up to hundreds of musicians to achieve real-time syncing across household internet connections. 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 currently available applications compress audio, significantly lowering the sound quality. A beta version of JackTrip Virtual Studio is currently available free of cost to users through the end of 2021.

Initially developed in Silicon Valley during the Coronavirus pandemic as a platform for local choirs which discovered they were unable to sing together over the internet due to the inherent audio lag time, JackTrip Virtual Studio has since been adopted by musicians around the world. Users are now discovering the myriad ways it can be used post-COVID, including collaborating with musicians far apart, coordinating sessions with guest composers/ directors/conductors unable to travel, enabling music lessons with students miles or even continents away, and hosting breakout rehearsals between music sections or individual members.

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.

Hal Leonard is the world's largest print music publisher, with the leading methods for learning guitar, piano, band, orchestra, plus publications for learning virtually every instrument imaginable. In its catalog of more than one million available titles, Hal Leonard represents many of the world's best known and most respected publishers, artists, songwriters, arrangers and musical instrument manufacturers. Its products are sold in more than 65 countries throughout the world.

In addition to being the leader in printed music publications, Hal Leonard has also led the way in digital music technology, including developing SheetMusicDirect.com and GuitarInstructor.com. Hal Leonard operates Noteflight.com, a music composition website, and Groove3, a website providing online training for music technology. Hal Leonard also created Essential Elements Music Class, a cloud-based, online resource for music education, and Essential Elements Interactive, an online component of the popular Essential Elements instruction used by more than a half million students during the school year. In addition, Hal Leonard developed MyLibrary, a cloud-based portal where customers can access online audio using unique codes inside Hal Leonard books. Audio can be streamed or downloaded and includes PLAYBACK+, a multi-functional audio player that allows users to slow down audio without changing pitch, set loop points, change keys, and pan left or right. In 2020, Hal Leonard launched its own proprietary streaming e-book format: Hal Leonard Digital Books. These interactive, cloud-based publications were designed especially for musicians and include access to embedded video or audio on many titles. More information can be found at halleonard.com.

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