Grammy officials clarify stance on AI-generated music
The Recording Academy says it does not plan to completely ignore AI-generated music, but will robots be able to win Grammys?
Grammy officials are sharing some clarity on how the Recording Academy will recognise AI-generated music at its awards ceremony.
Artificial Intelligence is under the spotlight in 2023, with companies in various industries using this technology.
Several AI-generated songs have caused controversy over the past few months. An unofficial mashup featuring Rihanna and Bad Bunny went viral in April. AI was able to perfectly clone their voices from previous music so that song sounded like the original artists.
Drake and The Weeknd's voices were also cloned for an AI song called, 'Heart On My Sleeve'. The track was promptly removed from Spotify and Apple.
AI was also used to generate a new song featuring late South African rapper Riky Rick. The song was cleared by the 'Boss Zonke' hitmaker's family.
Record labels such as Universal Music have called for streaming services to block AI-generated songs that clone musicians' voices, labelling it as "fraud".
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MUSIC: New Riky Rick song
— Kgopolo (@PhilMphela) June 15, 2023
Using AI and Riky’s own words from his social media posts, the song was woven together by Riky’s long-time collaborators Ganja Beatz, Audio Militia, & Lebo Machudi.
Newly formed Riky Rick Foundation is behind the release of the track.#KgopoloReports pic.twitter.com/blCsmO09HE
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The Recording Academy announced last week that it has updated the rules for its Grammy Awards. A section on 'Artificial Intelligence (AI) Protocols' states that only human creators will be considered.
"Only human creators are eligible to be submitted for consideration for, nominated for, or win a Grammy Award," it stated.
It added that "the human authorship component of the work submitted must be meaningful".
Speaking to The Hollywood Reporter, CEO Harvey Mason Jr. reiterated that they will not be giving awards to AI.
"If you’re awarding a Grammy to AI, I would be uncomfortable or even curious to know who we’re going to give the Grammy to. So for now, we’re going to … give the Grammy to the human side of the creativity," he said.
Music creatives will be able to create songs with AI, but Harvey says they can only win a Grammy for the human portion of the track.
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Some have called for AI to be banned completely, but Harvey explains why the technology can't be ignored 100%.
"We all can acknowledge that AI is going to be a part of the future of our society, our culture and it’s definitely going to play a role in arts and entertainment. So for us, it was important to be proactive, make sure we started the discussions as early as possible," he said about including AI protocols in its updated rules.
He explained further that "if you’re a human and you wrote the lyric and you did the track and the AI sings it, we’re not going to disqualify it".
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Main image credit: Instagram/PhonlamaiPhoto
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