You’ve probably seen one of his videos before, but you may have already forgotten. Keenan Cahill, who made a name for himself at the very beginning of the 2010s with videos in which he played playback, died on Thursday December 29, two weeks after open-heart surgery, American media report. Affected by Maroteaux-Lamy disease, hence his dwarfism in particular, he was 27 years old.
Keenan Cahill had found success with very simple videos, showing him singing in playback on various music, when he was only fifteen years old. His first, a video on “Teenage Dream” by Katy Perry, now totals more than 58 million views. The success was such that several artists made videos with it, including Jennifer Aniston, Flo Rida, Cody Simpson, Justin Bieber, The Wanted or even Doc Gyneco.
“I started recording videos because I liked singing and acting at the same time. For my 13th birthday, I received a computer with an integrated webcam. And I wanted to have fun, so I started to sing in front of my computer, then to lip sync,” Keenan Cahill said in an interview. He will also try his hand at music with his own singles, without success.
The cause of death of the young man, who has 740,000 subscribers on YouTube, is not known. However, he announced on Instagram on December 13 that he would undergo open-heart surgery two days later.