Listen (5:02)
February 3, 2025
Technology has increasingly impacted the music business, leading to job displacement for professional musicians in more than a few ways. Historically, the industry has faced similar challenges. For example, one-fifth of the American Federation of Musicians (AFM) movie pit orchestra jobs were lost within two years of the release of “The Jazz Singer” in 1927, the industry's first talking film. This represented over 20,000 jobs lost in one of the worst times in history to be out of work in the United States.
Additionally, late 19th-century coin-operated music boxes and player pianos evolved into the jukeboxes of the 1940s, which peaked in popularity during the 1960s and 70s, displacing many local bar bands, solo artists, string quartets, and jazz combos. By the mid-2000s, digital sample libraries had advanced significantly. It was surprising for non-musicians to discover how many symphonic movie scores were generated and performed digitally rather than by human musicians. So, when the prevailing topic of AI and its impact inevitably arises, I hear Mr. Daltrey singing, “Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.”
The term AI is also becoming increasingly doctrinal, which is an odd evolution from its beginnings: it’s tech-bro jargon from the 1950s, the early computer era, co-opted by a group of current computer scientists and programmers who came of age 30 years later. AI is a human collaboration. ‘It’ learns from us. Elevating its status to a deity, outside force, or something “else” is misleading. At best, the label is misapplied, and at worst, it is misunderstood, and it is far too easy to botch a technology when it is misunderstood. AI is not an entity but a tool generated by synthesizing human data.
Unfortunately, musicians and music creators are not compensated for the work that AI tools excavate. This problem also extends to other professionals, including graphic designers, illustrators, photographers, video editors, writers, animators, and others. Why would they be compensated? What would be the incentive? We have given tacit approval to the process by not doing anything about it, and this includes even realizing that, because of our inaction, we became the gadget.
Baby steps have been made toward "data dignity," a term coined in 2018 by Jaron Lanier and E. Glen Weyl, an extension of the idea that our online clicks and views and onscreen time deserve compensation; the data we create is, in fact, labor and should be appropriately remunerated. Some progress has been made, primarily to educate at this point, in California, which is significant in no small part to its stature as the fifth largest economy in the world. I am concerned that the next steps of organizing into collectives, guilds, or unions seem frustratingly hesitant.
The emergence of AI-generated music marks a seismic shift in the music industry, and I am most concerned about the creative side of the process in the long term. These advanced tools are now capable of composing entire tracks. This development has already replaced composers, especially in contexts like podcasts, video games, and other media where music serves as a background rather than the main focus. It will certainly continue to do so and in more significant numbers.
It is predicted that by 2028, AI-generated music will account for approximately 60% of revenues in music libraries. This shift will have profound implications for professional musicians contributing to these libraries. Moreover, within industries such as film, television, and gaming, AI is increasingly utilized during the conceptual stages of production, creating fewer opportunities for artists who typically charge hourly.
The influence of music streaming platforms cannot be overstated. AI-driven recommendations and curated playlists have led to a 20% increase in song streaming. This trend favors AI-generated content over selections made by human curators, which could irreversibly reshape the listening experience.
This is the hardest pill for me to swallow right now because it changes the whole concept of music. AI is not the steam engine, spinning Jenny, the power loom, the cotton gin, the locomotive, the telegraph, the telephone, the steel plow, the incandescent lamp, or the internal combustion engine. These devices made many redundant but were tools, not other beings or gods.
The philosopher Sherwin Wine, who was labeled "the atheist rabbi” by Time magazine in 1967, had a prophetic, at-the-ready rejoinder when asked about technology, which has been my own lately and will serve until a better, more positive and proactive one matures: “I’ve always said there is no God. I never said there wouldn’t be one in the future.”