I think I know what you’re trying to say, but I genuinely think your experience as a live musician is affecting your ability to get your point across. A computer is an instrument, the same as any other musical instrument. If I open up a tracker and drag notes onto a roll, I am operating in a medium utterly unlike playing an instrument live. Is the result music? If I use an algorithm to put the notes on there for me, but then I move some of them around to get a better result, is that music? If I like the result as-is and don’t do anything to it, is that music? If doing any of these things fills me with joy and a sense of accomplishment, should a live musician feel sorry for me for not experiencing music the way they think it ought to be experienced?
Please also keep in mind that my responses weren’t towards the OP. They were toward the person who said that they setup their computer to create music for a client while they went out for a jog. If you are jogging while your computer is composing, then I have a hard time considering that music. It is an artificially generated organization of notes. I still maintain that humans create music, not computers.
But the OP went farther than that, by claiming that I said that any use of computers at all makes it not music. Computers are helpful tools in the creation of music. In fact, they are essential nowdays, since nearly all studios have moved from tape-based to computer-based recording. I’m also not suggesting that everyone write out musical scores by hand, when computer programs can help speed that process up immensely. But again, that’s a far cry from “I set up my computer to write a song while I go out for a jog”. That’s the part that I was referring to when I said " I feel sorry for those who will never share that joy, simply because it is easier to sit in a room with a computer and have it shit out something that sounds good to you."
I hope that clarifies my position.
I’m far from just a live musician. I’ve spent decades in recording studies composing music for paid clients. As I just explained, my responses were to someone who said they set up their computer to compose something for a client and went out for a jog while the computer did the work.
What you described is absolutely music. Going for a jog while the computer spits out a tune is not, in my opinion.
You were responding to a whole bunch of people in that thread, who were explaining a whole lot of different ways they used computers while making music, so while its nice that you decided to make that distinction here, it feels a bit post hoc.
So if you hear some recorded sounds, you can’t decide if it’s music or not until you determine the process used to generate the sounds?
Coincidentally (or not?) Grimes voices a chrome-skinned pop star named Lizzy Wizzy in the video game Cyberpunk 2077. Maybe she decided she liked the idea after all!
Yes, as I stated - “I do apologize for not addressing each point you all made individually.” I was in a hurry and made a blanket post rather than being careful to attribute each comment to an individual poster. I clearly shouldn’t have done that, and won’t again. It was sloppy posting. But I was also being attacked from multiple angles.
Can you determine whether AI generates a poem or a human does? In most cases, it is usually painfully obvious. Same with music, but I’m sure there are exceptions. I just haven’t heard (or read) any yet.
Consider yourself lucky to have never experienced the dregs of human artistry. There is terrible, terrible poetry and music out there, made completely without computers.
Don’t be sure. I’ve heard “Afternoon Delight” by the Starland Vocal Band. I’m well aware of horrible human created art. And while it is true that hearing something terrible doesn’t mean it was created by a computer, I’ve yet to experience the opposite, something really good written by a computer.
I’ve lost what you’re saying. Is it “terrible sounds made by either humans or computers are not music”?
No, that’s not what I’m saying. Quality isn’t the only factor here. Do you think someone deserves credit for creating something when all they did was instruct a computer to create it. If I tell Word to spell check a document, does that make me an editor? If I tell a computer to compose 500 words on eating sushi is the result, MY creation, or the computer? Should I consider myself a composer if I tell a computer to generate 10 minutes of music and it spits something out that I had no role in creating? My position is that no, I cannot take credit for those things.
I was asking for clarification about this:
You say that the process used to generate sounds determines whether or not the sounds are music. I’m trying to figure out how you determine what you’re hearing “in the wild” is music or not, when you don’t know the process used to generate it.
If it’s good quality (by whatever criteria you use), you’re okay with assuming the process is consistent with music-making. If it’s poor quality, it’s unclear to me if you would call it music, not music, or undeterminable.
Edited to add: I’m not asking about the role of humans in the process, I’m only asking about your determination of whether or not sounds you hear are music.
I’ve never once suggested that quality determines whether something is music or not. You’ll need to ask someone that feels that way. By admitting that I’ve heard plenty of bad music, that should have answered your question.
My argument is that computers are incapable of creating art.
Yes, and that is why I’m asking: when you hear sounds, how do you determine if the sounds are music or not? Or, when you see an image, how do you know if the image is art or not? Especially when you don’t know the process used to generate the sounds or the image.
I think I’ve already answered your questions. Do you have a point?
Hi!
Once again, I think you’re misunderstanding - and its entirely possible I didn’t communicate my process well.
Look at it this way - ever use Blender for 2D/3D animation or an NLE (Resolve, Vegas, Premiere, etc.?) for some long-form video? Maybe Unity or Unreal, FMod or wWise? I dabble with Blender (for making music visualizations), so I’m going to use that as my example.
After someone creates a 3D animation in Blender, by rigging and keyframing the modifiers, and everything else involved, it’s time to render the final file so it can be ingested. That can take anywhere from minutes to hours, to days, depending on the complexity and available computing power. Let’s say it takes 40 minutes to do that render.
Are you claiming that going for a “jog” during that render time would make that person not an animator?
Hopefully that clarifies what I was referring to…
In rendering video or animation, the creation process is already done. Are you saying that you instructed the computer to render the music after you had already created it note for note, or did the computer have a role in randomly creating something based on the parameters you set?
Xenakis (1971) wrote
I’m saying both - I spent a couple hours tuning the parameters to meet the needs of the pieces (background music for spoken mediations). I selected the instruments, and any other audio I may have chosen (birds, rain, etc…you know the drill), tuned it in the samplers, set the loop points, synced the delays, dialed in the 'verb, chained the audio signal together and then determined the notes for it to choose from (ended up being either C or G pentatonic major to match speaker’s voice best without retuning it via Melodyne), set duration, octave and told it which rhythms it WASN’t allowed to use.
Then I rendered and had a nice walk.