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For Video Soundtracks, Computers Are the New Composers (npr.org)
Reader jader3rd writes: NPR has a story about computer composed soundtracks being used for small video projects.
Ed Newton-Rex, the company's founder, is a composer who studied computer programming, and says he started to ask himself: "Given what we know about how music's put together, why can't computers write music yet?" "You basically make a bunch of choices that really anyone can relate to," Rex says. "That's one of our aims. We wanted to make it as simple as possible, [to] really democratize the process of creation." Despite the successes there's been limited investment, because audiences and producers are uncomfortable with it. "On the credits they don't want to see 'Composed by Computer Program Experiments in Musical Intelligence by David Cope,' " he says. "It's the last thing they want to show their audience."
Ed Newton-Rex, the company's founder, is a composer who studied computer programming, and says he started to ask himself: "Given what we know about how music's put together, why can't computers write music yet?" "You basically make a bunch of choices that really anyone can relate to," Rex says. "That's one of our aims. We wanted to make it as simple as possible, [to] really democratize the process of creation." Despite the successes there's been limited investment, because audiences and producers are uncomfortable with it. "On the credits they don't want to see 'Composed by Computer Program Experiments in Musical Intelligence by David Cope,' " he says. "It's the last thing they want to show their audience."
But how much longer will that last, until audiences are comfortable with seeing that a movies soundtrack was computer composed?
They've found people simply don't care. It's the same with bands that used to play in bars and clubs. The venue owners found out they didn't have to pay live bands or performers,
I used to play guitar in bands 25+ years ago. I'll never forget a discussion I had with our rhythm guitarist one night. Being that he was probably almost twice my age, I figured he was old and didn't know what he was talking about. He told me that no one really cared about anything we did as long as the drum beat kept time. He explained to me that he thought there might be one or two people out of 500+ in the crowd that would even notice if one of us made a mistake.
To prove his point, during a song in the middle of the set he let go of the fret-board and strummed the open strings a couple of times. Not a single person stopped dancing, or even noticed as far as I could see. No one said a thing to us about it. While were were packing up, the owner of the bar even told us we were really on that night. So, you're probably right.