[changing1999]

AI mentioned above is not at the level of capturing and expressing ideas or emotions beyond "a sad rock song about a breakup". Try guiding it to express any clearly formed musical idea.

Author's attachment is to a large degree based on the false notion that they somehow contributed to the creation process.

The generic, frigid, un-interesting "product" that is produced by said AI is why no one other than the prompter is moved by the result.

[joshstrange]

That’s just not true. I’ve used Suno to generate songs where I have provided all the lyrics. Those lyrics came from a combo of LLMs and my steering/direct edits and then I ran the lyrics through Suno multiple times until I got something I wanted.

I can agree that:

> "a sad rock song about a breakup"

Is probably not going to capture or express your ideas or emotions because you haven’t given it enough. In contrast, writing the lyrics or giving the model a ton more context can absolutely produce something that captures and expresses your ideas and emotions.

At the end of the day I don’t make music for the masses (hell, I’ve only generated a handful of final songs that I’ve liked) but the people I have made them for (or the ones just for me) have enjoyed them quite a bit.

I’m not a songwriter nor am I a musician and I never will be. That’s not where my skills lie and it’s not a skillset I want to learn and hone. AI/LLM tools give me the ability to express myself in a medium that previously was effectively impossible and it makes people I care about smile and that’s good enough for me.

[changing1999]

Providing lyrics is called "writing lyrics". If you think that pasting lyrics into a prompt makes you somehow more involved in the process of writing music I don't know what to say.

> can absolutely produce something that captures and expresses your ideas and emotions

The right analogy here is to imagine an infinite museum where you can wander until you find a piece that expresses your emotions. It has nothing to do with the act of your expression, and everything to do with you resonating with a piece produced by someone/something else.

> At the end of the day I don’t make music for the masses

Fair. But you also don't "make music" for yourself. At most you write lyrics.

[jcims]

This is a tad overwrought. There is a creative process, but it’s much more akin to simple producing rather than composing.

My point wasn’t to debate the merit of generated music, it was simply to highlight the effect I described.

[changing1999]

It's not closer to producing that it is to composing. In fact, I would say it's closer to composing in the sense that you can at least add lyrics and pick a genre.

Production requires specifying very precise requirements, which the current gen AI is unable to follow. Even at the most fuzzy production level like "a song with strings and a choir", Suno will generate something completely irrelevant. And if you will try to go deeper -- use a classic Moog synth line in the chorus -- don't expect to generate something meaningful.

I won't argue that in the most broad sense, prompt engineering is a creative process. Picking which shoes to wear to work is also a creative process. My argument is that this has barely anything to do with the process of music composition or production. You can literally reuse the same prompt to generate an image or a poem.