Spotify, AI, and Musical Creativity

Please join us for a lecture given by Michael Simon, Senior Lecturer of Music, Music Technology & Production, Bass, Chair.

This lecture takes a look at how recent technologies in the music industry have changed how musicians create, who is heard, and how musicians make a living. With its heavy investment in AI trained on the artists it platforms and its control of the vast majority of how we hear music, Spotify wields outsize influence in a fundamental area of human creativity. Simultaneously, music AI generation through apps like Suno are fundamentally changing what it means to make music. While the business of music has radically changed in the last 15 years, platforms like Patreon have responded in new ways, helping musicians fund their artistic endeavors in a changing landscape. This talk will look at the intersection of technology, the economics of music, and the nature of modern musical creativity.