After hearing about how artificial intelligence can be used to create music, I was instantly worried about musicians and their careers. Musicians are not working in a recession-proof industry, so economic struggles of any severity are particularly worrisome for people whose careers are in music. Looking back at the history of the music industry, it is interesting to see how musicians always seem to prevail. For example, when the radio was first introduced, musicians were worried that they would lose a major revenue stream because people would no longer need to see them live to hear their music. When Napster was introduced in 1999, musicians were once again terrified that their career pathway was doomed because listeners could simply listen to their music for free via the internet. There are a few other historical instances of musicians’ jobs being threatened, but as you can see from these examples, the music industry remains alive despite encountering various alarming technological disruptions.
Even when the industry experienced a trough in 2014 that was a direct result of the digitization of music consumption, it immediately bounced back after sites like Grooveshark were shut down (RIP) and consumers had various digital service providers (DSPs) to choose from. Apple Music, Spotify, Tidal, and other platforms revitalized the music industry’s ability to bring in revenue, and the musicians dodged another bullet. Streaming services still pay artists very little for each individual stream, and many artists are busy working to change this. Low streaming royalties remain a problem as of 2023, but musicians may need to turn their attention towards another imminent threat: artificial intelligence’s ability to make music. Most of us have already heard about AI voice replication. It is surprisingly accurate and has tricked me on multiple occasions. Voice replication can be used in conjunction with a site like ChatGPT to create an entirely new acapella with original lyrics. Furthermore, AI music generators can create the music itself. When all three of these elements are joined together, a song is created. Anyone including those who know nothing about music theory can do this, so should musicians be worried?
Art is something people make to present to other people to try and elicit an emotional response. At its most basic level, music consists of sound waves, and sound is produced when an object vibrates. Our ability as humans to tame this chaos that we call noise and turn it into an orderly arrangement that is music has always been fascinating to me, and now it can be done by artificial intelligence. An example of this complicated process will help anyone that is confused gain a better understanding of how it works.
In 2021, Sean O’Connor used Magenta, which is a Google AI program, to create a song in the style of Nirvana. The program analyzes a set of works and can compose music in the artist’s style. After examining all the intricacies, patterns, chord changes, drum sounds, and lyrics of around 30 songs, the AI program has a basic understanding of how an artist would create a song. For the Nirvana project, Magenta read the songs as MIDI files, which are translations of a song’s notes and rhythm into digital code that can be put through a synthesizer to play the song (Rolling Stone). The computer then reads every detail of the composition and creates music that people can select the best parts of. Taking 20-30 songs and separating each into the solo, hook, and verses is a necessary step because the computer struggles with reading entire songs. After someone selects the best parts of the computer’s creations, they are joined together and audio effects are added to finish the production process.
When creating the lyrics, an artificial neural network was used to scan through many of Kurt Cobain’s songs and output new lyrics in his style. It took multiple pages of generated lyrics to find phrases that matched the Magenta-produced vocal melodies. The finished product is here: Drowned in the Sun (impressive, right?). After reading about this complex process, I am surprised by the amount of human intervention required to create a song made by artificial intelligence. The computer can create music in the style of an artist, but a majority of it is awful and requires the human ear to discern what is listenable.
My main takeaway after reading about how artificial intelligence creates music is that it is still dependent on humans. Similarly to how we can not predict a hit song, artificial intelligence can not create songs on demand that we think are good. When creating a song with Nirvana’s sound, there were plenty of sounds that the computer was easily able to produce. However, it took people hours of listening to select the best parts. From there, a person had to mix and master the song to finalize everything.
Giving artificial intelligence a clear framework of what to create works somewhat well, but what if it was given free rein to create whatever it wanted to create? Would an entirely new genre of music be introduced if we were to let it produce music on its own? These are all questions we might have the answer to over the next few years, and for now, I think musicians are safe. There is no real ethical concern for musicians that are using artificial intelligence, and those that are using it are using it as a co-creator (Science Focus). It is easier than ever to create music given our current state of technology, and there are successful modern artists, such as Steve Lacy, that have produced hits only using their smartphones (Wired). Artificial intelligence might enable more people to make music, and I see this as a good thing. It would also be fascinating to see what artificial intelligence could create if it were prompted to blend multiple genres together. All things considered, musicians should not be worried about artificial intelligence taking their jobs.
Matthew, great blog post. You wrote this incredibly well. I think that AI has the potential to help the music industry. Just like AI is most likely going to come alongside many different jobs and support them and make them more efficient, I think AI will do similar in the music industry. However, I do worry that the quality of many artists will fall if they rely too heavily on them. Music is fascinating because there are intentional mistakes, such as dissonance, that I do not think AI will be able to replicate. There is a human element, that makes music, music.
As we say in class, I think musicians that use AI will outperform musicians that don’t. I recently saw one of my favorite artists Yoke Lore had Chat GPT to produce song lyrics in his style. The output was crazy cool. I could see other artists doing something similar and then great the actual beats themselves. I’m excited to see the future of AI and music.
This is a great piece Matthew. However, I think music will always be something that needs to have that human aspect to it. Talented musicians such as Steve Lacy will over time rise to the scene simply because of that, their talent. If anything, I believe AI would only be successful in writing a successful jingle for small businesses and their advertisement starts trending. Do you think AI could create I’m Just a Bill by Schoolhouse Rock?
Advertisements and jingles would be a great use of AI, I hadn’t thought about that yet. I’m Just a Bill is legendary but I think I’d rather hear AI’s version of Smash mouth’s All Star.
Hi Matthew! I liked how you mentioned obstacles that have continuously impacted musicians, and how they only conquered them. I wasn’t surprised to see that the AI generated music wasn’t good especially because art and music in general isn’t something that has a set standard of how to do. Everyone is able to be themselves and show their talent and that’s the best part about it. I think AI will play some role in the music industry soon but it’ll be interesting to see how impactful it is and what lots of people think about it. Great post!
Hey Matthew, this post was very interesting. After seeing how steady the music industry has remained through out multiple technological changes, it does raise the question can it do again? I believe it can, but with the use of AI, I could see artists getting royalties from using their voice in a AI generated song. I also think AI will create genres that have not been created yet. I am excited for this. I believe one of the main reason people listen to music, is to relate lyrics to their own life. So to be able to place your own life within the lyrics of an AI generated song, sung by your favorite artist, could be very interesting.
What a great post! I fall back to my usual mantra that AI will not replace musicians, but musicians who use AI will replace musicians who don’t. A huge part of music is the inspiration from the human experience, but other parts are craft honed by years of practice in learning. I think AI can help with the latter, but might struggle to identify the former.
Hello Matthew! This was a fascinating post to read. I have been recently hearing music made by AI and it’s crazy to see how they sound basically the same as if it were a real recording. I never knew that this is made possible through Magenta and am interested to see the future of this technology. I wonder if artists will try to shut it down or if they even care about this new technology. I am excited to see the future of this and think that it will be exciting to watch how this develops as more and more people use it.
Hey Matthew! I believe that music and art is so personal and can only be rendered as “good or bad” by humans- not AI. Even amongst humans there are various opinions and diverse tastes in genres for music, so AI will never be able to replace music or musicians because AI does not have the capability to understand emotions. Art and music elicits an emotional response, so how could AI know the difference between sad, happy, or “chill” music like we do?
Hi Matthew, this is such a unique topic for your blog post! Like you said, AI is still very reliant on humans for the creation of music, but we are starting to see how AI will be very helpful in the music industry. I will be very interested to see how many different ways that AI will help with music creation (instrumentals, voice generation, etc.) and if we can get to the point where humans do not have to be involved in the process of AI music generation. Overall, great post!
Hey Matthew, this is a big issue that I haven’t really looked into, so I’m glad you did for me! It’s scary to think about all of the jobs and industries that AI might take over, but it could end up being better for everyone in the end. I have heard about how platforms like Spotify will not be able to maintain their current strategies, and we will soon see huge changes in this industry. I wonder how much of an impact exactly AI will have in this field, and if it will be better or worse.
This was an interesting read! Current AI technologies rely on previous human data/info to make predictions which shows their dependency on algorithm creation. I think AI will become dangerous when it has enough information to create something from nothing. I’m not sure if this will happen in our lifetime but it is really fascinating to see how many industries, such as the music industry, AI has already transformed. The spotify AI song recommendation feature, Spotify DJ, is a another interesting breakthrough in the music industry.