Dr. Valerio Velardo

Senior Data Scientist at Musimap

Valerio Velardo was a co-founder of Melodrive. Which was the first AI music engine that generates video game music in realtime. In which the generated soundtracks evolve endlessly and adapt their emotional features, based on the narrative and visual state of the game. Now he is a consultant and freelancer in the AI audio/music industry. He holds a Senior Data Scientist position at Musimap, where he develops Machine Learning algorithms for music analysis.

Since January 2020, he has been running The Sound of AI YouTube channel, providing educational content on AI audio/music’s technical and business aspects. Valerio also founded The Sound of AI Slack Community, which boasts around 2,000 members including learners, practitioners, and researchers.

He is leading the OpenSource Research project, a collaborative research initiative in AI music, involving hundreds of members from The Sound of AI community. In which he develops new project management techniques for coordinating large-scale, remote, voluntary teams.

Valerio’s academic background is as diverse as it is impressive, holding a PhD in AI Music and degrees in both music (composition, conducting, piano performance) and astrophysics. He has a long-standing engagement with programming and AI, research experience in music cognition, and a deep interest in the philosophy of science.

He is an avid advocate of agile methodologies, clean code, test-driven development, and the lean startup approach, with a strong belief in open source and open science principles.

🌐 Speaker webpage

A Journey Through Generative Music AI

On April 10, 2024 at 05:00 PM (UTC+1)

Generative music is a rapidly growing field that has garnered attention from researchers, creatives, and the music industry. This talk aims to provide a comprehensive overview of the history and current state of AI-generated music. It will highlight the most iconic systems that have been developed in the space, and delve into the challenges and limitations of generative music. The discussion will also look towards the future prospects of AI in the music industry, and consider how these developments may shape the creation and consumption of music in the coming years.

Useful links

Youtube Channel

Ask your questions to Valerio Velardo!

Given the significance of artists' identities and presentation in music culture, as well as fan attachment to those, how do you perceive the challenge of establishing distinct identities for AI-generated music? Can AI-generated music achieve cultural relevance and popularity without the presence of human artists?

by Anastasia Shulman

Is it possible to use AI in the teaching scene of music and theater? And how could it be for example?

by Charlotte Bettermann

Given your experience, when AI would be only a sound or short melody.. What would you think it would sound like?

by Alisa Valentiner

When AI can design Songs and melodies on itself. How and where do you define what e.g. a sad or a happy song sounds like?

by Johanna Fritzmeier

I saw the video which is ‘8. Limitations and Future Vision – Generative Music AI’ in your youtube channel. You said that solving the curse of DL is ‘Merge DL and symbolic AI’. But I read article from Autoblocks AI, it says ‘The main limitation of symbolic AI is its inability to deal with complex real-world problems. Symbolic AI is limited by the number of symbols that it can manipulate and the number of relationships between those symbols.’. So I’m wondering that when we consider this point, symbolic AI matches with generative music that have to consider melody, harmony and so on.

by Daeun Jeong

Nowadays exist multiple songs which sound very much alike and it is much more difficult to create something new these days, which does not have similarities to other known songs. Do you think AI could study human music and develop a new genre?

by Mercedes Neuwirth

Could AI complete fragments or unfinished compositions of famous composers, such as Beethoven, in the same style and quality as the composer himself would have? (E.G. after studying the composers style)

by Mercedes Neuwirth

Do you believe that AI is or will be capable of innovation, when it comes to music? If it can only simulate innovation through the reproduction of provided data, could we end up with a lack of development in the field, if AI takes a more central role in the music industry?

by Eva Madl

In your exploration of AI-generated music, have you encountered instances where AI systems have demonstrated unexpected creative leaps or innovations?

by Emilia Hauschild

So far it seems like AI music hasn't managed to create as big of a splash as AI text and image generation. What do you think will need to happen for AI music to truly reach the mainstream?

by Michael Buchholz

How do you see the role of AI in the music creation? As a tool for music composer and beatmaker or as a totally autonomous generator of music? What was your vision by cofounding Melodrive? For example Melodrive with the real time generation music for video games is a completely new usage case but could AI be used for making a film music or anything else instead of a composer?

by Antonin Couton

Given your extensive experience in developing AI for music analysis and your insights from leading The Sound of AI community, how would you approach entering the field of generative music AI if you were to start over?

by Lea Zeilbeck

Are there already some notable examples of generative music AI use in the industry today?

by Jannik Vieler

Where do you see the most promising use cases for this technology? And where do you think AI generated music still falls short, requiring human creativity?

by Niklas Evmenenko

Is it fundamentally possible to generate AI music live based on a user's emotions?

by Janis Reisenauer

What is your perspective on the future of Generative Music AI in terms of its potential impacts on the music industry and artistic creation?

by Amir Al Nahawandi

As someone passionate about agile methodologies and lean startup principles, how do you apply these approaches to the development and management of AI audio/music projects?

by Annika Grauer

I think that music can be popularly preferred only when it can buy people's sympathy. Can music using AI really receive public sympathy? What are some things that AI music has different advantages from existing music?

by Junghyun Lee

What do you think is applicable in such traditionally respected domains such as music composition process, conduction and performance? Is there any place where you think AI could do better or bring some changes to the current "system"?

by Vlad Panait

Can Generative Music AI be considered an artistic entity in its own right or is it more of a tool for human artists?

by Marco Kosa

Could ai help with creating sound effects for video games or movies?

by Julius Greppmair

What role do you think AI will play in the future of the music industry, especially in terms of creativity and individual musical expression?

by Isabella Deisinger

How do artists and musicians collaborate with generative music AI systems, and what are the implications for the future of music creation and consumption?

by Kuan Hua Chen

How do artists and musicians collaborate with generative music AI systems, and what are the implications for the future of music creation and consumption?

by Kuan Hua Chen

How does generative music AI contribute to the democratization of music creation?

by Sandra Fae

I think AI is a great tool that can be integrated into various aspects of daily life. Among them, it seems like you're focusing on businesses that combine AI and music. I'm curious about why you chose music out of many fields to integrate with AI.

by Sumin Lee

What do you think is the benefit of AI creating music in comparison to humans creating music and vice versa?

by Eduard Krasnov

There is the field of Physics Informed Neural Networks (PINN). Do you think something similar is possible for symbolic music generation, i.e. to integrate music theory into the objective function that is being optimized (as far as I know PINN deals only with regression and not with classification).

by Benedikt Zönnchen

What are your views on ethical issues related to the use of AI in art and music? Should there be limits to the use of AI in creative processes?

by Kathrin Liesens

Reflecting on recent events where an AI-generated song gained unexpected popularity, how do such occurrences impact artists and fans' views on AI music? What ethical considerations arise from the dissemination of AI-generated music in popular culture? (e.g. that's what happened with Bad Bunny, a latin American singer, that got mad after a song was generated with AI, and got viral on TikTok)

by Xhenis Metolli (Jenny)

What significant instances exist where generative music systems have been integrated into live performances or interactive installations, and what effects do they have on audience interaction and engagement?

by Timo Warendorf

How can AI-generated music become culturally relevant and develop its own identity without human artists?

by Sophie Schmitz

To what extent do you think AI-generated music can be used in music therapy to create customized therapeutic experiences?

by Viktoria Grigoriev

How does Generative Music AI influence music production and the creative process of artists?

by Sarah Obermaier

With the rise of generative music startups, how do you think AI-generated music might change the way we discover and listen to music in our daily lives?

by Xhenis Metolli(Jenny)

Can generative music compositions infringe upon existing copyrighted works, even unintentionally? How can creators avoid such issues?

by Lena Ertl

Will Generativ AI eventually replace smaller artists since they don’t have the money and resources to defend themself from getting their ideas stolen?

by Daniel Wiesenfeld

Why aren't we seeing as impressive a breakthrough in music generation as we are in image and video generation? Is it a matter of time or investments, or is music intrinsically more challenging to model with ML?

by Téo Sanchez

What are your insights on expressing emotions in AI music? Will AI music express different expressions for the same song like a human in the future?

by Grace Chang

What impact do you think the use of AI in music will have on the dynamics within the industry? For example, there are always cases where labels are in dispute because they hear certain chords from their own songs in other labels' songs.

by Melanie Bauer

How does your degree and knowledge in astrophysics impact your creation of AI music? Did it benefit it in any way?

by Samuel Pucher

What is the potential of AI in reviving music that has been lost to time? (Asked during the Presentation)

by Mert Kafali

How do you think we can effectively address possible copyright infringements while still fostering creativity and innovation in ai music?

by Anna-Lena Scheunemann

In your collaboration with AI systems, how do you perceive the transformation of the physical body and its virtual representations in contemporary visual culture?

by Janis Reisenauer

In your collaboration with AI systems, how do you perceive the transformation of the physical body and its virtual representations in contemporary visual culture?

by Janis Reisenauer