Non-Musicians - How to Compose a Song Using ChatGPT
I recently discovered ChatGPT is a pretty good composer. You can try it out for yourself, even if you aren’t a musician. Here’s the prompt I used:
Create a song in the style of the classic Jazz tune “All of Me” including lyrics and use abc notation.
I imported the result into music buddy and here’s what I got:
It’s remarkably good. I could hand that chart out at a gig and our fans would be none the wiser. They’d think it was a Jazz standard they’d not heard before.
The software engineer part of me thinks all of this is pretty cool, in spite of the fact that the entire profession of software engineering (my profession!) is under threat of AI. The musician part of me is mortified.
Why the difference? Software engineering is a way to make a living. That has changed considerably since I started my career, and it will continue to change. We will evolve, as we always do, to meet that challenge.
Music though, is sacred ground. Uniquely human. Emotional. A language unto itself. This is a far bigger threat, and we need to draw the line.
The same goes for creative writing, or any form of art. Want to save some time writing a manual using AI? Go for it. Want to tell a story or share an experience and cut some corners by using AI? Please, don’t.
Spotify and Medium and any platform that is used primarily for sharing our humanity should strictly forbid the use of AI.
And, while we’re at it, musician’s, please don’t use backing tracks for live performances. If you can’t play it live, you can’t play it. No cheating.
As cool as “All for Tonight” is, I won’t be sharing that chart with my bandmates. I’ll hold the line.