5 ms·

Are there models that generare MIDI instead of audio? IMO this would be much more useful.

by pier25 2y ago

anigbrowl 2y ago
This. Generating audio en masse is everything that's wrong with LLMs, and people trying to use them this demonstrate a *fundamental misunderstanding of music. The whole attraction of music is separate generators in temporary harmony, whether rhythmic, tonal, timbral. Generating premixed streams of audio ('mixed' implying more than one voice or instrument) completely misses the point how music is constructed in the first place. Anyone advocating this approach is not worth listening to.
- ganoushoreilly 2y ago
  While I mostly agree with you, we know that music is defined by the listener. Who are we to discern what is or isn't music? Do you have the same opinion of text or code generated by or with the assistance of AI?
  - mdp2021 2y ago
    The poster presents criticism against an architectural model. > Who are we to discern what is or isn't music? Hopefully, people with good judgement, potentially capable of evaluating products. The poster is clearly meaning "good music". > Do you have the same opinion of text or code generated by or with the assistance of There you go: the same way we note that some NN generated text is missing crucial qualities (e.g. intelligence), or that some NN generated images are missing crucial qualities (e.g. direction), you can surely admit the possibility that some NN generated sound may be missing relevant crucial qualities to the vetting of a good critic.
    - ganoushoreilly 2y ago
      What is Good music though? That's the whole point. Plenty of people listen to stuff I would consider weird and non music, but to them it is.
      - mdp2021 2y ago
        Well if they call it "good music" because "they like it", that does not form a theory of music; whereas if they call it "good music" because they recognize it as an expression of good artistic form, and they are of promising judgement, than their theory could be translated into a generative architecture.
        ganoushoreilly 2y ago
        It's up to the listener to apply whatever semantics they need to as justification. There is no purity test for music. The theory is just that theory.
        mdp2021 2y ago
        > The theory is just that theory. Well no, Feyerabend let himself be called an "anarchist" but clearly there is a "more scientific" and "less scientific" - they cannot give you a lecturing appointment at the LSE or elsewhere to just shrug. > the listener ... as justification As justification to what? A producer makes products for different markets: people may sell bars of sugar with appetizers and synthetic flavours, that does not make the product remotely similar to healthy food.
        ganoushoreilly 2y ago
        Dismissing certain musical forms as lacking artistic validity because they don’t adhere to a predefined theory ignores the cultural, emotional, and contextual factors that shape artistic expression. Just as culinary traditions differ across regions and personal tastes vary, music exists in diverse forms that may not conform to classical or academic frameworks but still hold meaning and value for listeners. While food has measurable nutritional values and health impacts even the implied sugary items like candy, still provide some nutritional value, even if overwhelmed by the non nutritional ingredients.
        anigbrowl 2y ago
        You keep arguing about validity but you're missing the point of how music is made. I'm not talking about 'only humans can be music because they alive', it's that music is fundamentally combinatorial, even if you're combining recordings of construction equipment to make industrial noise music. If you're generating the entire thing at once rather than stems or note data, you just have an elevator music generator which inexorably tends toward the lowest common denominator.
  - anigbrowl 2y ago
    I think LLMs are great for summary or pastiche text. They do OK with poetry, but obviously this is a pastiche of existing poetry by necessity, since it can't be rooted in human experience (unless you want poems about being a computer, but that's not what most people have in mind. I think they're great for code, although within rather tight limitations in my experience. The problem with LLMs for music (as currently implemented, not inherently) is people keep training them on complete tracks. They're very obviously being trained by people who are not musicians.
- peab 2y ago
  From the artist perspective, this is correct. But there are lots of applications for music which parallel the applications of ai generated images - things that are more commercial in nature. The media is functional, for use cases such as commercials, or social media type videos, where people just need something for the ambiance and don't want to deal with copyright or anything like that.
- xvector 2y ago
  I don't really care about those fancy music theory terms. All that really matters is whether users like what the generator generates
- bongodongobob 2y ago
  I almost never use midi and beyond chord charts, none of the musicians I know write scores. No one is preventing you from creating in the way you like, get off your high horse. Do whatever makes you happy.
  - anigbrowl 2y ago
    Nobody mentioned MIDI or scores except you. I don't know what you imagine you are responding to.
- mdp2021 2y ago
  I am not sure that the internal process could not work through conceiving «temporary harmony[...] rhythmic, tonal, timbral [etc.]». Furthermore, the sound itself is crucial, so perfect calibration of a perfect sound is definitely a part of what can be clearly be sought (when you do not want to leave that to a secondary human process in the workflow).
vunderba 2y ago
MuseNet by OpenAI used to allow you to do this - but OpenAI took it down over a year ago. https://openai.com/index/musenet https://openai.com/index/musenet Also, Synfire is a somewhat difficult to grok DAW designed around algorithmically generating midi motif as building blocks for longer pieces. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OrtJjEiWBtI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OrtJjEiWBtI It's not particularly well-known but it's been around for many years.
verst 2y ago
Lots. For example, there are dozens of models that specifically have been trained on Bach MIDIs to generate new Bach style compositions. However, the generated MIDIs definitely do not sound like Bach :) I'd link to some specific examples (easy to Google or search on GitHub) but I can't recall which models were more successful than others.
- vunderba 2y ago
  Almost nobody remembers it, but if you go back far enough, there was a Sid Meier game on the 3DO that algorithmically generated music in the style of Bach called (appropriately enough) CPU Bach. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJkPWSKuTHI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJkPWSKuTHI
  - verst 2y ago
    That's awesome! First time I've seen this. And coincidentally until today I had never even heard of the 3DO console. (I myself grew up on Amiga 500) Having taken a class on Bach style composition in college - I think a rules engine with a random seed would certainly be much more successful at generating Bach style compositions than any neural network-based model ever will be.
    - vunderba 2y ago
      I agree especially given how logically Bach structures his contrapuntal stuff. I also took a class on counterpoint and the professor had the great idea of using Gradus Ad Parnassum as our textbook. Very rewarding class but there's far more approachable books on counterpoint these days!
      - verst 2y ago
        Now I'm going down the rabbit hole of using a 3DO emulator (Opera) and running the CPU Bach ROM. :) And here is an interesting patent that Sid Meier and Jeff Briggs filed for their work on C.P.U. Bach: System for real-time music composition and synthesis https://patents.google.com/patent/US5496962A/en https://patents.google.com/patent/US5496962A/en
kadushka 2y ago
https://www.aiva.ai https://www.aiva.ai generates MIDI and provides editing UI.
adarob 2y ago
http://magenta.withgoogle.com http://magenta.withgoogle.com has quite a few

Are there models that generare MIDI instead of audio? IMO this would be much more useful.

by pier25 2y ago

Are there models that generare MIDI instead of audio? IMO this would be much more useful.

This. Generating audio en masse is everything that's wrong with LLMs, and people trying to use them this demonstrate a *fundamental misunderstanding of music. The whole attraction of music is separate generators in temporary harmony, whether rhythmic, tonal, timbral. Generating premixed streams of audio ('mixed' implying more than one voice or instrument) completely misses the point how music is constructed in the first place. Anyone advocating this approach is not worth listening to.

ganoushoreilly 2y ago
While I mostly agree with you, we know that music is defined by the listener. Who are we to discern what is or isn't music? Do you have the same opinion of text or code generated by or with the assistance of AI?
- mdp2021 2y ago
  The poster presents criticism against an architectural model. > Who are we to discern what is or isn't music? Hopefully, people with good judgement, potentially capable of evaluating products. The poster is clearly meaning "good music". > Do you have the same opinion of text or code generated by or with the assistance of There you go: the same way we note that some NN generated text is missing crucial qualities (e.g. intelligence), or that some NN generated images are missing crucial qualities (e.g. direction), you can surely admit the possibility that some NN generated sound may be missing relevant crucial qualities to the vetting of a good critic.
  - ganoushoreilly 2y ago
    What is Good music though? That's the whole point. Plenty of people listen to stuff I would consider weird and non music, but to them it is.
    - mdp2021 2y ago
      Well if they call it "good music" because "they like it", that does not form a theory of music; whereas if they call it "good music" because they recognize it as an expression of good artistic form, and they are of promising judgement, than their theory could be translated into a generative architecture.
      - ganoushoreilly 2y ago
        It's up to the listener to apply whatever semantics they need to as justification. There is no purity test for music. The theory is just that theory.
        mdp2021 2y ago
        > The theory is just that theory. Well no, Feyerabend let himself be called an "anarchist" but clearly there is a "more scientific" and "less scientific" - they cannot give you a lecturing appointment at the LSE or elsewhere to just shrug. > the listener ... as justification As justification to what? A producer makes products for different markets: people may sell bars of sugar with appetizers and synthetic flavours, that does not make the product remotely similar to healthy food.
        ganoushoreilly 2y ago
        Dismissing certain musical forms as lacking artistic validity because they don’t adhere to a predefined theory ignores the cultural, emotional, and contextual factors that shape artistic expression. Just as culinary traditions differ across regions and personal tastes vary, music exists in diverse forms that may not conform to classical or academic frameworks but still hold meaning and value for listeners. While food has measurable nutritional values and health impacts even the implied sugary items like candy, still provide some nutritional value, even if overwhelmed by the non nutritional ingredients.
        anigbrowl 2y ago
        You keep arguing about validity but you're missing the point of how music is made. I'm not talking about 'only humans can be music because they alive', it's that music is fundamentally combinatorial, even if you're combining recordings of construction equipment to make industrial noise music. If you're generating the entire thing at once rather than stems or note data, you just have an elevator music generator which inexorably tends toward the lowest common denominator.
- anigbrowl 2y ago
  I think LLMs are great for summary or pastiche text. They do OK with poetry, but obviously this is a pastiche of existing poetry by necessity, since it can't be rooted in human experience (unless you want poems about being a computer, but that's not what most people have in mind. I think they're great for code, although within rather tight limitations in my experience. The problem with LLMs for music (as currently implemented, not inherently) is people keep training them on complete tracks. They're very obviously being trained by people who are not musicians.
peab 2y ago
From the artist perspective, this is correct. But there are lots of applications for music which parallel the applications of ai generated images - things that are more commercial in nature. The media is functional, for use cases such as commercials, or social media type videos, where people just need something for the ambiance and don't want to deal with copyright or anything like that.
xvector 2y ago
I don't really care about those fancy music theory terms. All that really matters is whether users like what the generator generates
bongodongobob 2y ago
I almost never use midi and beyond chord charts, none of the musicians I know write scores. No one is preventing you from creating in the way you like, get off your high horse. Do whatever makes you happy.
- anigbrowl 2y ago
  Nobody mentioned MIDI or scores except you. I don't know what you imagine you are responding to.
mdp2021 2y ago
I am not sure that the internal process could not work through conceiving «temporary harmony[...] rhythmic, tonal, timbral [etc.]». Furthermore, the sound itself is crucial, so perfect calibration of a perfect sound is definitely a part of what can be clearly be sought (when you do not want to leave that to a secondary human process in the workflow).

vunderba 2y ago

MuseNet by OpenAI used to allow you to do this - but OpenAI took it down over a year ago. https://openai.com/index/musenet https://openai.com/index/musenet Also, Synfire is a somewhat difficult to grok DAW designed around algorithmically generating midi motif as building blocks for longer pieces. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OrtJjEiWBtI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OrtJjEiWBtI It's not particularly well-known but it's been around for many years.

verst 2y ago

Lots. For example, there are dozens of models that specifically have been trained on Bach MIDIs to generate new Bach style compositions. However, the generated MIDIs definitely do not sound like Bach :) I'd link to some specific examples (easy to Google or search on GitHub) but I can't recall which models were more successful than others.

vunderba 2y ago
Almost nobody remembers it, but if you go back far enough, there was a Sid Meier game on the 3DO that algorithmically generated music in the style of Bach called (appropriately enough) CPU Bach. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJkPWSKuTHI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJkPWSKuTHI
- verst 2y ago
  That's awesome! First time I've seen this. And coincidentally until today I had never even heard of the 3DO console. (I myself grew up on Amiga 500) Having taken a class on Bach style composition in college - I think a rules engine with a random seed would certainly be much more successful at generating Bach style compositions than any neural network-based model ever will be.
  - vunderba 2y ago
    I agree especially given how logically Bach structures his contrapuntal stuff. I also took a class on counterpoint and the professor had the great idea of using Gradus Ad Parnassum as our textbook. Very rewarding class but there's far more approachable books on counterpoint these days!
    - verst 2y ago
      Now I'm going down the rabbit hole of using a 3DO emulator (Opera) and running the CPU Bach ROM. :) And here is an interesting patent that Sid Meier and Jeff Briggs filed for their work on C.P.U. Bach: System for real-time music composition and synthesis https://patents.google.com/patent/US5496962A/en https://patents.google.com/patent/US5496962A/en

kadushka 2y ago

https://www.aiva.ai https://www.aiva.ai generates MIDI and provides editing UI.

adarob 2y ago

http://magenta.withgoogle.com http://magenta.withgoogle.com has quite a few