The extinction of musicians and the rise of the machine

The University Of Huddersfield's Dr Steven Jan and Valerio Velardo, co-editors of a new publication called the Journal Of Creative Music Systems, have suggested that there will be a future where computers automatically create a piece of music to suit the listener's mood, thus dispensing with the likes of Ed Sheerhan, Beyonce and AC/DC in the process - and the massive economic infrastructure that supports and markets artistes.

"You wouldn't have to spend a lot of money downloading your favourite tracks", says Jan. "You just tell the computer that you want a piece of music to suit your mood, or something like a piece that you heard last week, and that you want it to be about three minutes long". He added "The field of computational creativity is vibrant at the moment" and "There is work being done to develop programs that can paint and that can write poetry and stories and generate humour. But computational creativity in music hasn't been particularly well explored so far. Things that were thought impossible ten years ago are now becoming a reality". The press release also notes that "there is also the possibility that [the computers] could develop a musical language that humans are incapable of understanding or enjoying, but which could be appreciated by other machines".

http://www.hud.ac.uk/news/2015/september/journallaunchedforcomputersthatcancreatetheirownmusic.php