
Amper raises $4M to use AI to write music - bneiluj
https://techcrunch.com/2017/03/02/amper-funding/
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SwellJoe
$4M would pay for a lot of mediocre human composers to produce a lot of
mediocre music.

I understand the value proposition here and it's neat technology, I just think
it might still be a little bit early for millions to be pouring into the
field. Every example I've heard of "AI music" has been some level of failure.
But, maybe they just need a few million dollars to throw at the problem, and
it'll go away.

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Retric
The real niche IMO is in game music. If you can get the music to respond in
real time to players actions without becoming repetitive that's probably worth
100+M across the industry even if it's never 'great'.

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ORioN63
I think you nailed it.

The real utopia here is putting your headphones and listening to appropriate
and good music.

Music responding to gaming, sports, chill, on-the-train, falling asleep,
without user input would be pretty cool.

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xatan_dank
I think this company faces some serious challenges, but to me the main
challenge will be to create such incredible value from the interface between
customers and the intended product that it is wholly better to use their
software than just search "piano stock music" somewhere and pay a couple bucks
(or pay significantly more bucks for a producer's labor).

From what the article says, it looks like this company is looking to provide
their software as a tool for companies to generate stock music with minimal
effort. They claim that stock music currently available for purchase is both
overpriced and generally insufficient for commercial projects with specific
demands. Perhaps it's also implied that paying a producer would similarly be
too steep of a cost. My main issue with Amper's concept is not that the
creation of music with AI is too farfetched- that is not a new concept. My
issue is that the value of Amper's software depends on their ability to
optimize the process of creating music according to strict specifications-
something that I think is bottlenecked by the speed of human conversation.
Like any producer, AI software can get the ball rolling, but ultimately
creative decisions have to be made intelligently somewhere, and there must be
an exchange of feedback which is more efficient and stronger than regular
human conversation for Amper to succeed. Not only must the AI be very good,
but the user interface itself must be so good that someone without a music
production skillset and only a vague understanding of what's needed can do the
work. I think creating this kind of interface for a layperson is the bigger
challenge here.

I was also extremely unimpressed with the demo. The sound quality was very
poor for commercial music and there really isn't a lot of range shown in the
tracks. And it isn't because of soundcloud, there are plenty of even amateur
composers with more professionally produced music. I know it's supposed to be
stock music, but isn't this software supposed to be capable of generating
excellent, detailed stock music?

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maroonblazer
This looks promising. Having spent many years editing stock music for video
we'd spend considerable time not only finding the right mood/genre but also
editing the track to make it seem like it was "composed" specifically for the
video. So, I think this solution only addresses half the problem.

What would be better is if you could download the individual tracks to import
into a DAW where you could further edit/manipulate them to get that more
custom sound. I went through the "Pro" tutorial and this wasn't an option.

~~~
kristopolous
so would you like some kind of tool within the timeline of the video in order
to express things? Like some way to specify the a value corresponding to a
dimension of the mood? What else would be useful? Perhaps a way to place a
crescendo or a bridge? Would an option to do a MIDI export be useful?

I have no dogs in this fight, just curious.

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TheOtherHobbes
Interesting. Sound choices are good, but the chord/harmony logic is pretty
mediocre. I suspect there's an extremely simple Markov thing going on.

That may be good enough for production music.

At least it sounds like music, which puts it way ahead of most musical AI
projects.

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Nihilartikel
Well, the AI learned that Epic Cinematic soundtracks need the Inception BRAAAM
([http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/braaams-beginners-
how-...](http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/braaams-beginners-how-a-
horn-793220)) noise on every full measure. That's pretty impressive.
[https://soundcloud.com/ampermusic/epic-
cinematic](https://soundcloud.com/ampermusic/epic-cinematic)

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romaniv
We can't automate filling out Excel spreadsheets, but investing 4 million
dollars in automating music creation. Meanwhile there are plenty of CC-
licensed tracks and plenty of aspiring composers/producers who would gladly
work on creating tracks for "commercials or short online videos" for very
reasonable price.

~~~
CamelCaseName
I think the question is of quality. Many people can make music, and anyone can
automate making noise, but automating making music, _good_ music, is something
that's hard to do, and has a huge market.

One can hope that one day we'll be autogenerating music based on individual
preferences in a way that every piece you hear is a unique arrangement.

~~~
duality
I wouldn't want that any more than I'd never want to eat a favorite dish
again. Novelty can be nice but it's not the only thing that makes an
experience good.

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askafriend
Music, entertainment, and branding cannot be separated in the mainstream. Let
me put it this way - a large reason I listen to The Weeknd is because of the
interesting lifestyle and excess that he portrays through his branding, his
music videos, and his whole persona/vibe.

It's never _just_ about the music, which is why you see a ton of amazingly
talented SoundCloud producers that no one has ever heard of. They understand
the music but lack the branding and persona development that gets people to
actually stick to their music.

AI produced music will be like computer generated art - too distant for most
people unless there is another component on top of the music.

That's my initial take. Curious to see what people think of my opinion.

~~~
backpropaganda
While you're correct, AI musicians can easily have all the features of a real
musician. Check out Hatsune Miku. Although the music and lyrics are written by
humans, the singer is a completely fictional character who sings (generates)
the music. Fans love her (it?). So, we've already solved the persona problem.
Just need to generate good lyrics and melody as well now.

~~~
ss248
Not really. Hatsune Miku is more like an instrument. Like piano or violin, but
synthesized human voice (not completely synthesized even, they used voice
samples from the real human). Miku is one of many vocaloids. You can think of
vocaloid as family of instruments, like violin family in traditional music
with violin, viola, cello etc. In my opinion, she is not even the best
vocaloid, but most widely known for sure. And, as with all musical
instruments, it all comes to how composer uses her. Most songs you hear only
because composer is already fairly popular in doujin circles.

AI generated music is completely different field, because AI is the composer
there. This is why in the original article they talk about how they want to
create symbiosis of AI and human composer, essentially creating another tool
aka instrument, but this time human needs to do even less in terms of actual
music creation.

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deepnotderp
I'll bet money they just pulled tensorflow magenta off github.

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swengw
If you want to try generating music yourself using machine learning, check out
Magenta: [https://magenta.tensorflow.org/welcome-to-
magenta](https://magenta.tensorflow.org/welcome-to-magenta)

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bluetwo
To me the demo was a bit bland.

What it really needs is the ability to add cues, similar to how ML painting
programs are now giving you the ability to define areas of a photo/painting
(this is sky, this is water, etc).

If you could say I need 30 seconds of uplifting music for my trailer but here
are the 3 places where things are fast paced and here is the point that is
shocking, the AI could in theory accommodate that into one piece that aligns
with your already assembled visuals.

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raverbashing
I've listened to the examples and it seems a very nice work in progress

However it still sounds like basic themes put together and not a song with
beginning/middle/end

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diydsp
I can save people a lot of time: It's not about the information on the medium,
the .wav file the algorithm produces. It's about the context in which the
information is presented.

AI-generated music will go along with generic food and other products. Listen
already to the generic soundtracks on most Kickstarters. It works because
they're paired conspicuous consumption. Just use the phone app "SoundBot" to
make a generic chord progression with 1/8th note rhythms.

"Compelling" (a la Magenta) art and music will have to understand the context,
have a perspective and understand what is ineffable and attempt to convey it.
That's an unbelievably large machine learning task, having essentially no
boundaries and with very little data to source from.

Nevertheless, as a company, Amper may create some useful musical man/machine
collaboration tools.

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Insanity
Interesting coincidence. Just today I was thinking about when AI would be able
to generate music for in Clubs (which are mixes of other songs / sound-
effects).

I wonder how this will turn out. I did like the sound sample at the bottom.

~~~
empath75
It's extremely formulaic by design so I think that it's maybe not that far
off.

~~~
mb_72
As a 'traditional musician' (i.e. I play a couple of instruments, read music,
jam and write songs with real humans etc), I used to think this way, however
actual 'good' club music takes a lot of time to produce in terms of selection
and mixing and mastering of sounds. A friend of mine, who is a talented
performer and producer, deconstructed some of these tracks for me, and pointed
out just how much effort and talent it takes to produce good pop / dance /
club sounds. So while on the surface it would seem possible to do something
passable 'automatically', I am actually not too sure how good it would sounds,
especially to audiences used to hearing the best that most talented humans can
come up with. Allow me to coin the phrase 'club muzak' for what early AI
'composers' will produce (although I bet then that these 2017 'club muzak'
will become all the rage again across the solar system in the late 2050s')!

~~~
empath75
I used to be a rave DJ and am friends with a couple of producers. The core of
a dance music track is pretty well dictated by the sub-genre.

You can do a lot with a few wel chosen loops and generative music algorithms.
What really sets off the best techno tracks is engineering and mixing, and I
actually think that might be harder to get right with AI.

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6stringmerc
Obligatory Simpsons reference..."Don't praise the machine!"
[https://vimeo.com/18516240](https://vimeo.com/18516240)

Kidding aside, this looks useful for a specific audience and in a price point
consideration that hopefully gets traction. I've been fond of royalty-free
stuff via purchase / service for a long time, it's a great platform. Will be a
good one to keep an eye on!

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drewsilverstein
Hey guys... Drew from Amper here. Thanks for the feedback!

~~~
Taylor_OD
Drew,

Most of the sample tracks on SoundCloud are 30 second in length. Is the
platform capable of creating longer 2-4 minute songs right now?

~~~
drewsilverstein
Yeah -- we currently allow anyone to make music of up to 5 minutes in length.
Would love for you to hop on Amper and give it a shot!

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danjoc
Where's the AI? At best, it looks like they use a pre-trained algorithm to
generate output based on a few inputs. Similar to the deep dream visual
effects Google was generating a while back.

Amazon's recommender systems adjust dynamically, based on what users buy.
Google's handwriting recognition is learning every time you select the correct
choice and continue with your next scribble. How does this learn anything?

~~~
tonmoy
AI doesn't necessarily mean it needs to have learning.

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Existenceblinks
Do anyone know why music, video or basically media service|app have the dark
theme like PS, LR, Premiere Pro, Final Cut etc. ?

~~~
fastbeef
Easier on the eyes. When working with media you tend to stare at details for
long periods of time, a dark theme makes the UI non-distracting.

~~~
vidarh
Everything I use a lot has a dark theme - it's easier on my eyes. That
includes websites, thanks to Stylish.

~~~
Existenceblinks
Could you share your snippet? I use stylish just for turning gray/dark theme
websites(domestic ones) back to colorful again since the King's passed away :/

~~~
vidarh
I don't use my own themes - that's the nice part about Stylish: other people
have made themes for most websites I use.

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lend000
The technology is definitely there (and it can be done in many ways); I
recently came across researchers/musicians using the self-organizing
properties of slime molds to create music:
[https://vimeo.com/163427284](https://vimeo.com/163427284)

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jlebrech
maybe danceclubs could have a webcam to the AI for it to gauge the reaction of
the crowd to a particular sample.

the first nights just monitor djs and then it can learn to be it's own dj. but
I think in a way it could only come up with similar styles.

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samfisher83
Even before machine learning people figured out the chord pattern of most
popular songs. You can probably program it use those 4 chords.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOlDewpCfZQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOlDewpCfZQ)

