The Future

Composed at Oxford University’s e-Research Centre, this track utalises some of the most advanced tools available to the modern musician. Based around a sample taken from a computer generated synthetic loop, the song’s hook was written and sung by a combination of two different artificial intelligences, one of which was trained using over 25,000 words of Rawz lyrics. Rawz also wrote one of his verses using lines generated by the A.I. in a similar way to composing a found poem. For the beat, Episode One sampled a piece of music generated by a web based platform which creates entire tracks from scratch using only information related to genre and beats per minute. Software which manipulates the human voice to make it sound like a range of different instruments was also used. The track was mixed using techniques that would be all but impossible outside of a Digital Audio Workstation.

The future of music will witness audio processing using neural networks and machine learning. Various software applications cater to music generation using deep learning technology. For instance, artists could use a creative assistant to save time during the composition process. In the future, this technology will become more accessible and powerful. AI can prove to be a reliable compositional instrument for both producers and musicians.

The applications of A.I. in music are not limited to composing, processing, and producing. Currently, the capability of artificial intelligence in understanding song structure is still limited, but experts suggest that the top 40 chartbusters will comprise of at least 20-30% songs entirely or partially developed by AI at some point this century. There is a possibility of AI becoming the musician rather than an assistant to the musician.

Music promotion and distribution services will also witness an increasing reliance on artificial intelligence in the near future. Spotify is the world’s biggest music service application. This is largely due to the early adoption of artificial intelligence. The music streaming service analyses geographic location, playlist data, keyword preferences, and song preferences of listeners to give a highly personalised app experience.

Future of music is still a mystery which will be unravelled with the passage of time.