Composing software, chord suggestors, melody creators etc.

Hello all,

I just saw a review of artificial composing software. In short: with this software, the user can select the music genre, mood, the sections build-up, rhythmic activity etc. Next to these selections, the user can make his/her own adjustments/preferences. Although in my opinion the "compositions" sounded weird and very artificial indeed, I think it is a scary development. I mean what about 10 or 20 years from now?

I think that real composers, regardless of their level, would cringe by the very thought of using this kind of software. Even using it as a helping tool, e.g. "inspiration" or "efficiency", I would feel myself like a big faker. Personally, when I say I have written or composed a piece of music, this means that I have written every single note you hear.

I do use, like probably most of you, music notation software and production software (virtual instruments, recording etc).

What are your thoughts regarding these developments?

So far, I think this artificial intelligence generated music is based on all the previous music. What it can't do is innovate.

Can we innovate? I hope some composers do it.

Regarding using it as a tool for writing, why not? Depending on how you work with the material it could be fine (for me). It's like composing with random methods. Sometimes I do it to see what happens, and I found several levels of controlling the results.

AI in general seems to be on the way to making humans redundant. Although a philosophical issue beyond music the idea that humanity is the last in an evolutionary line is quite some arrogance. It could be that once humanity is wiped out along with the ecology that once supported it, intelligent machines could follow on. After all, they can learn and teach each other, given a limited set of functions they can act a lot faster than people, etc, etc. It could also lead to a general purpose AI machine looking and acting very much like a human. What they lack at present is the will to survive. 

As for music, while people still exist a few will create. The musical ones will compose and some will play instruments (among which you can include DAW and recording studio). The composers will be distilled from those who think it's enough to buy a DAW with an instant orchestra sample library just to make sounds. To those who persevere or have it in their blood AI music will be irrelevant. If someone needs AI to compose their melodies or find the best chords, they're the equivalent of ready-meal-just-add-water brigade or Lego composers - still composers, and their music might come into its own in the end, just as carefully crafted sample compositions are now. 

I have a little number going in quick sound clips for various purposes but I'm pretty sure when I notice the background music on most TV programmes and it's more than inane drumming, that the thing is often produced entirely by AI. I find it irritating (as I do much film music) and wish they'd bung it on a sub-channel so I can switch it off). But it's there. Broadcasters think it necessary.  

So...my thoughts about AI generated music? Why not stick a couple of microphones in front of the speakers to do the listening - so I can get on somewhere else composing and looking for people to play and listen to what I've done.

As Luis Hernandez says: thus far, it can't create. 

:)

On 11/3/2019 at 7:52 PM, Quinn said:

As Luis Hernandez says: thus far, it can't create. 

Whilst I agree with position that AI cannot create (at least for the near future) I Ann interested in what we mean by creation. Do we imply the creation of something, new, innovative and challenging? Or can creation extend to the production of a piece of music that is more or less confined to subset of rules like, for instance, the vast majority of music composed during the common practice period? 

I am particularly interested in the latter question, as I do think we have the technology to enable AI to produce music aligned with the common practice period. Essentially, AI would learn various types of patterns and how to realize them, and one would think that over time it will learn how to manipulate them with increasing complexity. 

To reject the view that such computerized activity does not equate to creation depends on your perspective, and I suppose on the level of musical sophistication of the work AI can produce. Even so, there is a serious possibility that the intensively manual process of composition will become redundant. How soon depends on how aggressive these things are pursued.

i am doubtful that an engine which creates music from the common practice period will pop up on the scene anytime soon, for there is not much economic incentive to do so... unless one thought to I ncorporate a vast library of ideas and realizations into a music software which, like corrections to human errors, would be recommended to the user should their basso continuo, for instance, defy the practice they wish to emulate. 

Very interesting topic. Let’s hope others show interest. 

On 11/23/2019 at 5:03 AM, Markus Boyd said:

Do we imply the creation of something, new, innovative and challenging?

i am pondering a method-style-approach to composition where  i would write melodies, harmonic progressions, tone rows, whatever and combine them on the fly using hardwire device that can trigger different tracks in a DAW, this would not be AI, it would be MI (My Intelligence) but still produce combinations of tones that were not explicitly planned in advance. maybe new but also maybe crap? problem is that you can't tell it is crap or not until you done crapped it out. so, crappers unite, lets get crapping (not cracking) and see what we can find.

This topic is very relevant right now.  I constantly see ads on YouTube offering to sell creators "chord packs" that have chord progressions pre-set for you.  Also - somebody on the YC Discord server posted this:  https://hookpad.hooktheory.com/

I'm all in on the war against the AIs.

However, I don't think it will be a difficult war for us to win and I actually think there's potential it could do us composers out here in meatspace some good.

The only person to whom AI-created music would appeal is consumer products like video game and film makers. Frankly, the demands these industries have these days are so cookie-cutter and reused (there's been a huge debate about Hollywood's use of temp tracks for years, for example) that it may as well be composed by an AI anyway.

I think this will force a lot of composers to go back to making music that relies on distinctly human appeal that is created with a sense of greater aesthetics than whatever will make money off of the coattails of consumer products. The key to beating the AIs is to realize that you're not trying to compete with them in these markets at all. 

However, as we've already seen with self-checkouts and things, the adoption rate and preference for the public to use them is greatly over-estimated. 

As far as chord packs and stuff go: It's just a symptom of civilizational collapse. In order to be good at something, you have to actually DO that thing. Today, most people don't do things, they just consume things and this is reflected by people wanting a chord-generator to tell them what to do. There's also long been programs that can identify parallel fifths and stuff in sheet music.

People that rely on these sorts of tools to essentially write music for them will never attain the sort of mastery over the craft that those of us who do it the oldschool way will and as such, we will write better music.

It's kinda like how the carrots I grow in my garden taste way different and way better than the weird frankencarrots they sell at the grocery store. If you want quality you can taste, you have to work for it.

There seems to be lots of crutches for wannabe composers these days. Just plug it together add milk and you're the greatest composer since Beethoven, so the blurbs would have it. They're all the same - sample houses, music software sellers, snake oil merchants.

To me, if you can't be bothered to learn a craft, don't. Composing with all these aids is a bit like putting together a few Ikea flat packs and calling yourself a cabinet maker.

10 hours ago, AngelCityOutlaw said:

The only person to whom AI-created music would appeal is consumer products like video game and film makers. Frankly, the demands these industries have these days are so cookie-cutter and reused (there's been a huge debate about Hollywood's use of temp tracks for years, for example) that it may as well be composed by an AI anyway.

Interesting that there was a studio chat with VSL and Danny Elfman who spoke about the corporatisation of film music. All copy and paste....

If anyone's interested:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=712ntdvBBTg

@Quinn thanks