I've played guitar since I was 14 years old and started to write songs fairly soon afterwards. I've never been a prolific songwriter but enjoy doing it when I feel inspired. My guitar skills are somewhat limited even though I've been playing it for 48 years. Here is a song I composed for my late son called I've Been Thinking About You. I don't have much of a singing voice so I had someone called Marri Nallos sang it for me. I put this here to show you that I can write music the traditional way without A.I , although the backing track was created in Jamstudio.
So going back to the subject. When computer technology came along, along with the opportunity to create music with software, I was really interested in trying it out but in those early days the equipment needed was too expensive for me. When I finally could afford it, the programs were far too complicated for me to get my head around! My lack of musical keyboard skills didn't help either
But a couple of years ago I heard about the possibility of creating music using A.I. This intrigued me. Is it possible for software to create music that anyone would want to listen to?
One of the first websites I checked out was Aiva.ai, this website can produce some impressive sounding music, from classical through to Hip-Hop. I created this orchestral piece on it. I've called it Seven Sisters
The title of the piece comes from a local landmark of the same name. The Seven Sisters are a group of seven coastal chalk cliffs, and I thought the music sounded a bit like flying or riding over the hills that make up these majestic cliffs. At the other end of the spectrum this is an electric guitar piece of music created on Aiva called FreedomI think you will agree that it's really difficult to tell that they have been created by A.I, although I did a few minor edits. Aiva is good as they allow you created tracks of up to 3 minutes long for free, however you cannot claim they are yours unless you pay a fee. I own the music I produced on it. You can hear more of my music and download it to use for free on your video project from my Pixabay Page The downside with using Avia is that after a while the music tends to sound the same, and you really need to know how to use a DAW in order to edit the tracks. Also, it's up to you to submit your music to streaming services etc, which can be costly and time consuming.
The AI web based music app that I have most fun with is called Boomy This is a great place to create some pretty cool music. Boomy is very easy to use and is programmed to not always follow the rules of music so it can throw out some pretty weird sounds. You can set certain parameters such as style, tempo, instrumentation and production, but other than that it is down to the AI as to what comes out. Once a piece of music is made, the program allows you to break the track down to different sized pieces, so you can then delete bits that don't work, duplicate and copy and paste bits that do, and move bits of the music to places where you think they sound best. So although the AI does all of the hard work, there is still room for your own creativity. You can download any track that you create, add vocals (which is great for rappers) and then upload them back to Boomy. The downside is Boomy still holds the copyright. The upside is they do all the work of submitting your work to major streaming services and pay you 80% of any revenue generated. You can buy the copyright to any tracks you really want to own. My favourite setting is LoFi.
As someone who is in their 60s, I hadn't heard of LoFi before I came across Boomy, but since stumbling on Ithis style of music I have released a couple of LoFi/Hip-Hop albums under the name of Epoch One. Here is a track called Peruvian Dreams
This is one I have called Misty.
I have also created some EDM albums under the name of Edemy. This track is called Borderlands and is taken from the album of the same name.
I know that using AI to create music is cheating. I can easily create a new album in a couple of days - Even my album covers are created using A.I and Canva - but Boomy does allow me some creativity. It can take quite a few rolls of the digital dice for the A.I to come up with something that I feel is worthwhile working with, and even then 9 times out of 10 the track will need to be edited to get something worthwhile out of it.
I have no doubt that A.I music is here to stay and is opening music creation up to people who are not natural musicians. But even for those of us who are natural musicians, A.I generated music can be a springboard to creating something genuinely original by giving them a starting point, especially when they are struggling to come up with something new.
So can A.I create good music? I think it has great potential to, but it is much better with a little human intervention.
Main Image was created by me in Night Cafe
