Sonic Cubism/Futurism

 

Tullio Crali, The Forces of the Bend, 1930

With all the news that's being generated these days about music AI, It's not enough just to read about it or watch videos. What you have to do is listen to the music! If there is a link in the article, I'll go directly for that. But what I've been hearing for about five years now is not encouraging or interesting. It's essentially a fixation on the future. It's a form of futurism. Even science can become scientism.

Futurism isn't completely pejorative. I like lots of aspects of futurism, especially the artwork that was created over several decades after futurism first emerged in the early 20th century. What we're seeing now in music AI could perhaps be a parallel with futurism in art at that time.

Personally, what I think is interesting is that it might become a form of cubism, a sound of vision that is so recognizably innovative, that it would generate a zeitgeist. But I haven't heard it yet, and in order for me to continue on being interested or even following music AI, it would have to be a sonic cubism.