Grammys Make clear AI Eligibility for Awards

In 2019, Pitchfork reported that Warner Music had partnered with an app known as Endel which now appears like a forerunner of what we’re now calling AI. As Matthew Strauss wrote on the time, the app in query “creates personalised music for you primarily based on a temper that you may request” — and the Warner deal allowed its work to be distributed on a grander scale. That more and more appears like the start of one thing, a shift throughout the music business that urged that a pc program would possibly wind up changing into somebody’s favourite artist.

And now, the CEO of the Recording Academy, Harvey Mason, Jr., has clarified the circumstances beneath which an AI may find yourself successful a Grammy — or, in sure circumstances, not successful a Grammy. Mason offered the Related Press’s Maria Sherman (by way of ABC) with some clarification on what the establishment’s current pointers meant for AI-assisted music.

“Right here’s the tremendous simple, headline assertion: AI, or music that incorporates AI-created parts is completely eligible for entry and for consideration for Grammy nomination,” Mason advised the Related Press. “Interval.” Mason went on to make clear that “we aren’t going to offer a Grammy or Grammy nomination to the AI portion.”

“We don’t wish to see know-how substitute human creativity,” he added. “We wish to ensure that know-how is enhancing, embellishing, or additive to human creativity.”

It’s a nuanced place for a difficult — and consistently shifting — divide. The place, precisely, does an artist utilizing software program for his or her music finish and the software program start? A wonderful Philip Sherburne article at Pitchfork from 2022 explores a few of these very questions — and alludes to the musicians who’re utilizing AI to push their work into new areas as an alternative of merely attempting to reinvent the wheel.

That stated, it’s additionally unlikely that we’ll see (for instance) Holly Herndon nominated for a Grammy any time quickly — which is a disgrace, as her album PROTO is incredible. It’s additionally eminently attainable that the query of AI eligibility for Grammys will show to be a moot query, if nothing that may be described in that manner is definitely nominated — nevertheless it’s a problem that’s prone to loom over modern music for years to return.