More people have watched his video than live in the state of New Mexico, and it only been three weeks.
Caleb Hyles, junior in radio, television and film, has more than 2.6 million views of his cover of "Let It Go" from the movie Frozen.
Hyles has been making videos since 2003, but he has never had one of his videos gain the popularity of "Let It Go." Hyles credits a lot of his cover's success to the song.
"Every video I've seen of 'Let It Go' has become a thing," Hyles said. "I think people are so in love with this song, that if something comes along that is special, it's going to take off."
It was for this reason that Hyles wasn't entirely shocked when the hits began to pile up.
"I'm partially shocked, but I'm not full in shock because the nature of the song is so poignant to a lot of people," Hyles said. "I'm partially surprised that it happened to me just cause I've been running a channel for several years now and that's never happened to me."
One person who helped share Hyles' cover was Courtney Stringer, a close friend of Hyles, who began promoting the video via Facebook and Twitter.
Stringer said the video began to quickly gain hits after they created a fan page for Hyles and began asking people who'd commented on his video to like the page and spread the word about his talent.
Hyles said he chose "Let It Go" because it connected with him on a personal level and challenged him musically.
"As a singer, I love to try and stretch myself and do things I don't think I can normally do, and that song is not in my range," Hyles said. "The song is meant for women and a belting female vocalist, which is the complete opposite of me."
Although not a song for men, Hyles' cover has been well received and he contributes this to having kept his cover in the song's original form.
"There's a lot of male covers out there, but the only difference between mine and theirs is that mine is in the original key," Hyles said.
Hyles said this is important because it allows people to remix his cover with other's without having to edit the song. Fans have already inundated Hyles with duet versions of his cover.
"It's such a gratifying feeling knowing you've inspired someone to be creative," Hyles said.
Despite his recent YouTube fame, Hyles is yet to be approached to officially collaborate with someone. Hyles said ideally he'd love to work with James Hatfield of Metallica or Robert Lopez and Kristen Anderson-Lopez, who wrote the music for Frozen.
With Hyles only structured musical training coming in the form of a church choir, he resorted to an unusual method to receive feedback for his singing - a video game.
"I would attribute a lot of my vocal training to Rock Band because it scores you and it grades you," Hyles said. "It has that vocal training mood where it plays the tones and notes and it shows you how off you are, allowing you to adjust yourself on the fly."
In addition to operating a YouTube channel, Hyles is also active in multiple other musical areas.
"I'm in a fresh metal band called From The Dark," Hyles said. "Also I would love to perform more, do musical theater, act, any kind of medium that involves me getting to express myself is something I want to pursue."
"Caleb is not only a very talented singer, but also actor and drummer," said Steve Badskey, Hyles' church music director who has known him since he was a toddler. "He's a great unknown talent. I could see him making it on Broadway now, he has that level of natural talent."
For the time being, Hyles said he's just trying to stay grounded and enjoy continuing to make music.
Do you like this story? The Plainsman doesn't accept money from tuition or student fees, and we don't charge a subscription fee. But you can donate to support The Plainsman.
