Tag: artificial intelligence music

Artifical Intelligence Music Will Eliminate Royalities

The “jukebox that pays,” the major label’s Frankenstein, Spotify, is about to bite its enabler/creator (the major labels) in the ass. I saw some disquieting news today I thought I’d share. Spotify is planning to hire the Artificial Intelligence expert, Francois Pachet.

Francois is currently in charge of Sony Music’s Artificial Intelligence research for the last 20 years. He has been Director of the Sony Computer Science Laboratory. He is allowing his contract to expire and sign a deal with Spotify. Under his leadership at Sony, several AI-created compositions have been created and published. I’m not going to dignify these compositions by discussing them here.

I’ve written about how pedestrian this music sounded before, but I’d like to comment on a disturbing trend. Spotify supposedly engaged in fake artist/playlist creation to reduce royalty payments. Combine that with recent comments by Francois. When he spoke at Buma Music In Motion, friends of mine told me he felt: AI-written music inherently shouldn’t require any royalties to be paid to copyright holders after it is published.

And now he’s tasked with creating a toolbox for Spotify creators.

This can only mean Spotify wants to create a class of “lesser royalty status compositions,” eliminating the human incentive to create new music, therefore reducing the overhead by adding them to playlists.

As someone who made music in the golden age of recorded music, 1971-1984, I should embrace listening to a Muzak version of my era. But I don’t. At first I hoped AI and music would allow people to create music w/o years of instrument mastery, but now I’m afraid the role of AI will be subverted by business interests to avoid paying humans for music, and figuring out how to find and fool the truly passive music fan into listening to “royalty-free” music.

USING ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE TO CREATE MUSIC IS TRULY DISTURBING

hmi-logo-2The idea of using artificial intelligence to create music is a truly disturbing concept. The word music comes from the Greek word μουσική (mousike), which means “(art) of the Muses.” In many cultures, music is an important part of peoples’ way of life, as it plays a key role in religious rituals, rite of passage ceremonies, and social activities. The Sony Computer Science Laboratory has released several songs created by artificial intelligence. This is only the 1st step in complicated software replacing man. I have witnessed drum machines and digital samples replacing human music makers. It is a simple business equation, Artificial Intelligence doesn’t require the same funding human musicians require. As someone, who has been involved in music from an entertainment and business point of view, I FIND THIS TREND ACCELERATING AT AN ALARMING PACE. Music is a human form of artistic expression that is an endangered species. With the elimination of music education in our schools, this human art form needs to be preserved. So action is necessary!

With a lot of help,  I’ve creating a new website called HumanMusicIntelligence as a substitute for dwindling music education opportunities. It features music created by humans. This site allows anyone to enjoy the early history of human recorded music. FOR FREE.  As of 2017, this great music is in the public domain! I selected Jazz as the first genre to demonstrate the “joy of collaboration,” “the blending of instruments,” and “the value of the composition.” I am hoping to demonstrate the human’s ability to create a unique kind of music and art.I selected seven songs essential to the early roots of jazz and have posted them on the web-site. This kind of music is irreplaceable and may never be made again. Somehow I feel compelled to pay music back for the personal rewards I received. Just like any great art, that stands the test of time this music is a treasure.

I realize this isn’t about life or death, and I’m not anti-technology. I’m looking forward to driver-less cars and artificial intelligence’s contributions to medicine, but I’m afraid the use of AI in the music business, which has only profit as its motivation, and not the good of mankind or music. If you notice this  recent artificial intelligence release  is a spear headed by an large corporate, existing member of the music industry establishment, Sony. And they have convinced this music is worthy of discussion and criticism by knowable sources in the music and technology community. Do a Google search for artificial music intelligence to see the reach of this corporate music power. I wonder if they realize these efforts in artificial intelligence are going to eliminate the “golden goose” of recorded music?