ChatGPT as a songwriter

Subject: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: Jack Campin
Date: 14 Jan 23 - 05:53 PM

Anybody tried to get ChatGPT to write songs?

There is a story by Lem where someone creates an AI poet (and the hero fails to outsmart it how matter how bizarre the constraints he thinks up). That was some time before 1970; here we are.

The possibilities seem endless.

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: Joe Offer
Date: 15 Jan 23 - 02:29 AM

Wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ChatGPT. The article says, "ChatGPT was launched as a prototype on November 30, 2022, and quickly garnered attention for its detailed responses and articulate answers across many domains of knowledge. Its uneven factual accuracy was identified as a significant drawback."

So, are songs generated by ChatGPT folk?

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: DaveRo
Date: 15 Jan 23 - 03:08 AM

Jack Campin wrote: There is a story by Lem where someone creates an AI poet ...

I remember - it was called 'Trurl’s Electronic Bard'.

I was introduced to Lem by someone's sig on usenet, which read
"The whole plan hinged upon the natural curiosity of potatoes." — Stanisław Lem

I was thinking only yesterday, when somebody asked about Mudcat Search again, that ChatGPT could answer some of the questions here.

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: GUEST,The Sandman
Date: 15 Jan 23 - 04:18 AM

The idea does not appeal to me at all.

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: Jack Campin
Date: 15 Jan 23 - 08:38 AM

Wiki says "uneven factual accuracy" like it was a bad thing.

If you asked ChatGPT to write you a ballad about George Santos in the style of the Robin Hood corpus, isn't that exactly what you'd want?

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: Sarah the flute
Date: 15 Jan 23 - 04:29 PM

It is very funny. I asked it to write a song about a sailor going to sea and leaving his sweetheart behind and it did ....even with a chorus and then I asked it to change it so it sounded like it was from the 17th century and it did that too. Very good but a bit derived and of course no tune ....so its writing a poem rather than a song. You could put in bizzare combinations of things for inspiration!

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: GUEST,Anne Lister sans cookie
Date: 16 Jan 23 - 05:46 PM

The whole point of artistic creation (whether we're talking art, lyrics, narrative, prose) is the process, the development, the thoughts, the way in which it changes the creator along the way. The final product is what the audience hears, receives and sees, but the reason it comes into being is because of the initial spark and the way in which it changes as it's built upon. Yes, you might be able to replicate this final product using AI, but that is to fundamentally miss the point. Why are we even thinking of saving time and effort on this? Yes, I know you have to put in the prompts, but in that case why not actually work on it yourself? What is the problem that it's meant to be solving? Every song, every story, every article, every dissertation I've written has been, as they say, a "journey" - why would anyone want to short-circuit that? I'm asking a rhetorical question, by the way, but it's like asking a Word Unscrambler program to do the Wordle puzzle for you. It might work, but isn't the whole point to use your own brain?

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: GUEST,Phil d'Conch
Date: 16 Jan 23 - 07:19 PM

There are as many 'whole point ofs' as there are people doing it. Live or canned music has a lot of the same pros and cons. Humans are often "better" but rarely quicker or less expensive than a machine for the "good enuff" producers and consumers.

On the upside, there's now DALL-E, Lensa or Midjourney for your cover art.

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: MaJoC the Filk
Date: 17 Jan 23 - 10:50 AM

> On the upside, there's now DALL-E, Lensa or Midjourney for your cover
> art.

I read this morning that there's a class-action lawsuit that's just been started about that sort of thing, with another in progress about using AI to generate software, both in terms of violation of the copyright of the original works used in the training sets. Methinks the main upside in the immediate future is for the income prospects for m'learned friends.

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: GUEST,Anne Lister sans cookie
Date: 17 Jan 23 - 11:42 AM

Quick response to Phil d'Conch - if your post was a reply to mine, I don't think you read what I wrote. It's not about the cost, or the consumers. My point was that creating a song, a piece of art, a piece of prose etc is far more about what that act of creation is for the creator. A quick fix may be cheap and it may fill the commercial need, but it's not what being a writer, an artist or any kind of creator is actually about. I don't care how clever the program might be - it wouldn't and couldn't replace or replicate the creative process for the creator.

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: DaveRo
Date: 17 Jan 23 - 12:35 PM

It's in the nature of GPT - Generative Pre-Training - that it will produce language based on the texts it been trained on. So it can produce 'natural sounding' language - similar to what it has analysed. It's been used for computer code because well-written code tends to re-use constructions that have withstood testing and use. You don't normally want to write novel or unusual computer code - there are no prizes for originality!

Good poetry OTOH should surely avoid common constructions - cliché if you like - and aim for unusual and striking means of expression. So I doubt if ChatGPT will produce interesting poetry. I don't think that necessarily applies to songs, though. Great songwriters often manage to fit natural phrases into their rhyme schemes. I suspect a SongBot could produce passable songs if it had 'learned' some musical rules. It might even be quite original in musical and lexical structure if it was 'told' to break those rules.

Songwiting is not all inspiration. I recently watched an interview with Stephen Sondheim about how he came up with rhymes - he used a thesaurus and a rhyming dictionary. (The interviewer was shocked!)

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: GUEST,Phil d'Conch
Date: 17 Jan 23 - 12:53 PM

MaJoC: Funny recent kerfluffle over at r/Art where an illustrator was wrongly banned for submitting AI digital art as their own. It was theirs but they were advised to change their style to something more "human" anyways!

Anne: Read my first sentence again. I understand what you wrote. The point is... who, not what. It will not be your point unless you are deciding. The other 7.888 billion times, it will be somebody else's point, not your own... or mine.

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: GUEST,The Sandman
Date: 20 Jan 23 - 04:53 PM

I endorse wholeheartedly Anne Listers post

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Jan 23 - 05:29 PM

Would you buy the CD ?

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: GUEST
Date: 21 Jan 23 - 02:18 AM

Stephen Sondheim FFS, Not someone i would choose as a role model His motive for composing was commercial, this is rather like comparing Sliced White processed Bread to Home Baked , so he used a thesaurus? so what? it means nothing.other than that was his particular approach

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: DaveRo
Date: 21 Jan 23 - 04:24 AM

On a recent radio programme* on chatbot (academic) plagiarism a teacher said that 'the whole point of' writing an essay was to demonstrate knowledge, and lack of it, and drive the learning process. That's probably not the average student's point of view when faced with a deadline after a night out.

To some writing a song is an artistic endeavour. For some it's a job. For the Mastersinger of Nuremburg it was to marry the girl.

Nick Cave recently commented unfavourably on a song a chatbot had written 'in the style of Nick Cave'. Well of course he did. It would be amusing if a lot if his fans agreed that it was indeed 'in the style of Nick Cave'. And if they bought the track, would Cave sue for plagiarism?

* BBC Inside Science: Chatbot plagiarism

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: GUEST,TheSandman
Date: 21 Jan 23 - 04:48 AM

For some it's a job."
yes, and it shows that is why so much present day pop music is bland and inconsequential.

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: GUEST,Phil d'Conch
Date: 21 Jan 23 - 05:04 PM

Nerd alert: The etymology of cybernetics is nautical so we named our autopilot "Laplace."

...bland and inconsequential. -- To be realistic, the bar for singing frogs, dinosaurs and video game assassins is set pretty low innit?

As it stands, all 7.888 billion of our human points combined are no longer a majority of internet traffic. Bots #1.

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 21 Jan 23 - 09:39 PM

it wouldn't and couldn't replace or replicate the creative process for the creator
The discussion seems to have shifted from AI to querying the value of a thesaurus, a rhyming dictionary. . . you might as well add in a regular dictionary, books of good poetry, all of those things are tools to help writers make choices as far as what word to use and how a word works in a place, how it sounds. Rhymes or not, depending on the verses being constructed.

Reference materials are only as helpful with the power the writer brings to them. I found various rhyming dictionaries, foreign language dictionaries, thesauruses, books of mythology, history, and more in my Dad's papers. I'm sure he had them there to assist with the songs he was writing. He wasn't your signer-songwriter who was a commercial success, he was a reference librarian who loved to write songs about local history and events. Something AI probably wouldn't be useful for.

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: DaveRo
Date: 22 Jan 23 - 02:55 AM

No, my reference to a thesaurus and a rhyming dictionary was to demonstrate that, even for a great songwriter, writing a song never was a purely mental process - not purely inspiration. So a 'chatbot' is just another reference - a phrasemaking tool perhaps.

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: MaJoC the Filk
Date: 22 Jan 23 - 05:37 AM

Most people, I read, think that translators don't need dictionaries. One of the translators of the Astérix books said: "Translators wear out dictionaries."

OTOH: There was a research project to measure the usefulness of syntax-related highlighting in editors in learning how to program. (This colour-codes typed-in text, which helps people see whether what they're typing is kosher.) Those who had the help ended up needing the crutch, while those who didn't have the help ended up producing better code.

There's also been a study of whether AI can help write software. Upshot: those using the AI produced worse code with more security errors .... and had greater confidence that said code was secure. "Computer says YES," methinks.

My take: as with synthesisers, external aids help good people become excellent (esp under time pressure), but can't help those who can't see what's wrong with what the machine has said.

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: GUEST
Date: 22 Jan 23 - 08:00 AM

The average American today is working with no better than sixth grade elementary skills. As a whole, they don't produce a lot of deep lyrics or safe code.

Compare current AI to a trained , educated and experienced software development team and it will come up short. Compare AI to the average individual on the street and it is already head and shoulders above most of humanity.

Phil d'Conch

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: MaJoC the Filk
Date: 22 Jan 23 - 10:58 AM

IIRC, Phil, the groups in question were college-level CS students or others already in the trade, not your average Joe fresh off the street: they had an incentive to learn, and to learn well, but were let down by the shortcut. As in mathematics, there's no royal road.

Meanwhile, looping back to the Subject: writing lyrics well requires experience, both in writing and in life, and experience needs to be *lived*. ChatGPT and related AIs produce only artificial experience at best: useful in a tight corner, but not really helpful in the long run, and they open up the "machine knows best" trap at the user's feet. (See also the Asimov novella Profession [in Nine Tomorrows], which revolves around the concept of knowledge being dropped into the brain in one go. I've followed my own advice and dropped the URL to the synopsis.)

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: GUEST,The Sandman
Date: 22 Jan 23 - 11:31 AM

Anne Lister is a songwriter whose songs have been acknowledged by many as very good. quote from Anne
My point was that creating a song, a piece of art, a piece of prose etc is far more about what that act of creation is for the creator. A quick fix may be cheap and it may fill the commercial need, but it's not what being a writer, an artist or any kind of creator is actually about.

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: GUEST,CJ
Date: 22 Jan 23 - 02:04 PM

Hello! How can I help you today?



[e-mail]
Please write a song about concertina player “Dick Myles” who lives in Ireland but is from England, he wears good hats and is friends with Martin Carthy
Verse 1:
There's a man from England, now living in the land of green
He plays a concertina, and you know what I mean
He's got a style all his own, and a smile that's oh so bright
He's the one and only, Dick Myles, on a concertina tonight

Chorus:
With a twirl of his wrist, and a press of the keys
He'll take you on a journey, through melodies
With a hat on his head, and a tune in his heart
He'll play you a song, that'll set you apart

Verse 2:
He's got a friend in Martin Carthy, a true music man
Together they play, the best of the band
With a fiddle and a concertina, they bring the house down
Ireland's lucky to have him, Dick Myles in the town

Chorus:
With a twirl of his wrist, and a press of the keys
He'll take you on a journey, through melodies
With a hat on his head, and a tune in his heart
He'll play you a song, that'll set you apart

Bridge:
He wears a good hat, with style and grace
And when he plays, you can see the smile on his face
He's a true musician, a concertina king
With Dick Myles playing, the music will sing

Outro:
So if you're ever in Ireland, and you're in the mood for some tunes
Just look for the man with the concertina, and the hat that's so cool
He'll take you on a journey, with his music and his style
Dick Myles, the concertina player, playing all the while

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: GUEST
Date: 22 Jan 23 - 02:06 PM

Quick example, not intended in a malicious way, but feel free to delete.

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: GUEST,Phil d'Conch
Date: 22 Jan 23 - 04:02 PM

Human engineered AI is improving in leaps and bounds. Humans are not. 1970s -- programmable logic controllers first replaced the hard wired relay logic that had long since replaced human lower brain function in factories. Look at us now.

As it stands, the average American high school grad can't match ChatGPT's spelling and grammar modules alone and that gap is growing every day. Most teachers would be thrilled with the above lyric from a student, if it were not so obviously, far and away, too good to be true!

Expecting AI to write code, or lyrics, is asking for superior intelligence well beyond what the average human is capable of. It might take a another minute, but I wouldn't bet against.

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: GUEST
Date: 22 Jan 23 - 04:21 PM

firstly my name is Dick Miles;
Secondly Martin Carthy plays guitar not fiddle, but he has people closer at hand and a daughter who is a more accomplished fiddler than me.
The style of writing is reminiscent of William McGonagall
PoetSuccess to the good and skilful Dr Murison,
For golden opinions he has won
From his patients one and all,
And from myself, McGonagall.

He is very skilful and void of pride;
He was so to me when at my bedside,
When I turned badly on the 25th of July,
And was ill with inflammation, and like to die.

He told me at once what was ailing me;
He said I had been writing too much poetry,
And from writing poetry I would have to refrain,
Because I was suffering from inflammation on the brain.

And he has been very good to me in my distress,
Good people of Dundee, I honestly confess,
And to all his patients as well as me
Within the Royal city of Dundee.

He is worthy of the public's support,
And to his shop they should resort
To get his advice one and all;
Believe me on him ye ought to call.

He is very affable in temper and a skilful man,
And to cure all his patients he tries all he can;
And I wish him success for many a long day,
For he has saved me from dying, I venture to say;
The kind treatment I received surpasses all
Is the honest confession of McGonagall.

Subject: BS: HyperWrite Writing Assistant
From: Ebbie
Date: 22 Jan 23 - 08:21 PM

"Are you tired of staring at a blank page, struggling to find the right words, or spending hours editing your writing? Do you wish you could write faster, better, and more confidently, without sacrificing quality or creativity? Is your inbox overloaded? Do you want to write engaging and effective emails in seconds, without sounding robotic or generic?"

This comes straight from their promotion. It goes on from there.

Does this kind of thing alarm anyone else? Where are we going with it? Have we become so lazy and blase that we don't care whether or not talent and persistence are needed at all? For anything?

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 22 Jan 23 - 08:49 PM

Ebbie, your post was moved over here because Hyperwrite is the parent of the ChatGPT app. ChatGPT on Your Mobile | Hyperwrite made Mobile Version of ChatGPT.

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: GUEST
Date: 23 Jan 23 - 03:48 AM

Does this kind of thing alarm anyone else? Where are we going with it? Have we become so lazy and blase that we don't care whether or not talent and persistence are needed at all? For anything?"
Absolutely.
McGonagal may have been a mediocre poet, but at least he tried to do something creative.
The doggerel that was written about me shows the weakness of the GPT,
A set of uninspired words, no melody, dodgy facts.
there is no one correct way of writing a song, but from my own experience, a good song requires the writer to feel some passion about the subject matter.
Furthermore writing words and then a tune, is only one approach ,

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: Ebbie
Date: 23 Jan 23 - 05:06 AM

Ah, Stilly Sage, I didn't know that. Thanks.

What brought this on in my mind is that the other night at music, one friend said that he found this information with Spotify. He said he instigated one tune and that though it wasn't 'good', it wasn't 'bad'.

It just boggles my mind- I can't imagine an IT writing something that I spent time and thought and effort and experience in creating. I can't even compare it to anything else- maybe making love? Or marrying and bringing home the 'spouse' to deposit it in a corner?

Of filling one's library with just the outer shells of books? (I've seen that- in an 18,000 square foot home, of all things.)

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: Jack Campin
Date: 23 Jan 23 - 06:19 AM

I just asked ChatGPT to write a song about itself in the style of Bob Dylan. Seems it can't tell Dylan's style from a detergent commercial.

Subject: RE: ChatGPT as a songwriter
From: Jack Campin
Date: 23 Jan 23 - 07:57 AM

And here it is trying to rewrite the Dies Irae in the style of Dylan. No cigar for this one either. You'd think Dylan's doomier creations would be a better fit.

Verse 1:
Rollin' down the road of life, wind at my back
No fear of the grave, bound for eternity
So many battles I’ve faced, and looked death in the eye
It's been a long and hard road, but I can finally fly

Chorus:
Dies irae, dies illa, sorrow conquer'd today
Find me a way, to this bright day I’ll take my final ray
Dies irae, dies illa, life will overcome at last
Find me a way, to this bright day I’ll take my final stand

Verse 2:
Armed with the truth and the courage to fight
I will not accept the sorrow of life's dusk
Prayers for mercy, but no fear of the end
Death won't conquer my spirit, for I'll stand strong again

Chorus:
Dies irae, dies illa, sorrow conquer'd today
Find me a way, to this bright day I’ll take my final ray
Dies irae, dies illa, life will overcome at last
Find me a way, to this bright day I’ll take my final stand

Bridge:
Armed with a dream and a heart full of hope
I’m ready to face the voice who edges me close
Lost in memories, I can still be free
Hope that guides my journey and sets me free

Chorus:
Dies irae, dies illa, sorrow conquer'd today
Find me a way, to this bright day I’ll take my final ray
Dies irae, dies illa, life will overcome at last
Find me a way, to this bright day I’ll take my final stand

Subject: RE: BS: Was My Thread DELETED?
From: Donuel
Date: 23 Jan 23 - 07:59 AM

It costs $85 a year. Or 10 bucks for a week. 10 years ago I said I use autopost 2000 but now the real thing is here.
Chat GBT 4 is the premium version and costs more.
Once again it is only as good as the user. There is a big difference between asking Discuss consciousness and asking Chat GBT to describe consciousness in the words of Bertrand Russel