[AndyGoode]

This is why you feel the need to dance or tap your finger/ foot… the rhythmic influence is so strong it will affect your motor cortex.

Thanks for the terrific insights. I had come to similar conclusions about rhythm. Rhythm is the one component that is almost required in any musical composition, regardless of country or style. In modern drum circles, rhythm is the only component of the music, in fact. A (musician) friend of mine once made a terrific observation that corroborates this theory, when students before class were playing around with some resin chimes, which issue a shrieking, very sustained note at a single pitch, and he noticed that the people who were talking while the chimes were sounding would adjust their speaking pitches to match the pitches of the chimes. In general, putting both observations together, it seems that humans naturally adjust to match outside sounds however they can, in order to create the least discord. A related hypothesis from another (musician) friend of mine was that humans favor certain harmonies  (especially 5ths, 3rds, and octaves) because those harmonies cause the least physical pain when the waves coincide and cause what are called beats. (https://freethoughtblogs.com/atrivialknot/2019/01/26/measuring-musical-dissonance/) I haven't heard of any research on that, but it makes sense. Another corroboration was when I first bought The Beatles' "Abbey Road" album and was really getting into the rock song "The End" on that album once, and noticed that my heart was beating in sync with each pulse of the 4/4 rhythm. I'd never noticed that effect before. And most generally of all, we know that animals as well as humans are in sync with natural frequencies of all kinds: sleep every night, menstruation every lunar cycle, hibernation every winter, synchronized neurons (https://www.quora.com/How-do-neurons-synchronize), synchronized fireflies (https://www.nps.gov/grsm/learn/nature/fireflies.htm), and so on, so humans getting into sync with musical rhythm makes perfect sense.

As for the metronomes, I'd heard of such entrainment before, like clocks on the same wall coming into sync, but that was the most convincing demonstration I'd ever seen. I didn't know such entrainment happened so fast.

()
The End (Remastered 2009)
The Beatles
Published on Jun 17, 2018

[LOCKSUIT]

Andey, how do i share tracks like you did on AIVA for free?

Oops...my incredible track was actually Modern Cinematic, F major, Epic Orchestra

[HS]

So music feels good because it takes the pressure off our internal rhythm generators? Sort of allowing our nervous system to sail on the beat, giving our rowing muscles a chance to rest? In that case it could boil down to having the maximum number of assistive beats in your song. Though its probably best if those are a novelty. So maybe a progression through several rhythms would be better. Or adding a disruptive beat every so often, like when people jump from a sauna into a frozen river and back again, so they can appreciate the sauna.

[LOCKSUIT]

No no no lol. Music is entaintaining because it relates to your hobby. If  you like science, then you like thrill or Dr. Evil. If you like new laws, you like hitler rock. It's mental language, not so much pulses. That itself is another Rewards, indeed, but not the main-est cause.

[LOCKSUIT]

And, sometimes a song lyrics is alone the reason for liking......it is story liking, not pulse liking.

So much for korr's 1-man project

[LOCKSUIT]

And

DO YOU REALIZE how much pain I go through, to find just the right song for the moment of my evil attempts at AGI!? It's gotta give me thoughts on topic. It's related to my motives, not to turn my nerves on while I work. Not always got music on but I can remember searching my library...gotta be just right song. A good one.



Happy songs don't cut it, I use advanced music. Happy songs are for happy times instead. :>

[AndyGoode]

I think a major purpose of music is emotional communication.

More great insights, thanks. I've often heard that music is a universal form of communication, but as your wording suggests, there are other "purposes" of music, such as inspiration, memory aids, social glue, and so on.

As for music needing to be universal in message, that fits with the general wisdom of art that the best paintings, photographs, films, books, cartoons, etc. are about common universal experiences. Non-lyrical music and certain abstract art seem to contradict this at first because music and certain abstract art styles don't depict anything specific in a visual way, but in an abstract way I believe they still do.



I have a deep hypothesis about this, but as a concrete example, consider the song Korrelan posted:  "Lonely Boy" by The Black Keys. I looked up the chord progression for that, and it's: E G A, or more abstractly I bIII IV, which is a very common rock progression, and a very appealing one at that. (https://tabs.ultimate-guitar.com/tab/the_black_keys/lonely_boy_chords_1120149) Why is it so appealing? There are several reasons, but one reason is that the chords are ascending in an obvious way that most people can hear. Part of my hypothesis is that people unconsciously associate abstract emotional concepts with musical passages that reflect those concepts in an auditory way. In this case the emotional concept will be that of ascent/progress, and in this case the musical cause is that the chords are ascending. Here's some corroboration for that conjecture: Consider the jazz song "Movin' On Out". The chord progression has the same chord relationships as "Lonely Boy", bIII IV I, except with the key chord at the end instead of at the beginning of the cycle, and other slight alterations like a different key, different musical genre, and different instruments. The music has the same positive effect, in my opinion: an appealing, positive, powerful sense of progress...

()
Movin' On Out
Steve Graeber - Topic
Published on Oct 22, 2015


...so that lyrics are not even needed to reinforce that effect. Visually you can think of this song as a group of three steps that keeps repeating and therefore keeps ascending, with some sort of visual embellishments tying together or dancing around the steps as you ascend (vines? birds? butterflies?). The instrumental solos are the equivalent musical embellishments. The inspiring song I posted, "Venus Isle" by Eric Johnson, is quite similar, although the second chord is different: bVI instead of bIII, so it slightly alters the ascending effect. Again, the guitar solos at the end, which are the climax of "Venus Isle", are just embellishments over a chord progression that is inherently appealing and ascending, which Eric Johnson emphasized with the lyrics about ascent like "And blasted off to the stars." (https://tabs.ultimate-guitar.com/tab/eric_johnson/venus_isle_chords_2249021) I could give many more examples of corroboration of my hypothesis, if needed.

Where does my hypothesis leave us with respect to the nuts and bolts of creation of spiritual music? (1) I believe the songwriter should first decide exactly which mood they want to convey: amount of power (4/4 rhythm is more intense than 3/4 rhythm, for example), clarity of ascent (I bIII is more obvious than I bVI), piquancy (in a major key, tastefully flatted notes like b3 and b7 are more piquant than 3 and 7), and so on. Both the chords and the scales used in the song are affected by this decision. (2) Select chords and scales that will match the decision in #1. (3) With the underlying theory of the song in place, then continue to match decision #1 with specifics such as instruments, amount of harmony, specific chains of notes, and so on. (4) Test the success of the resulting song on people, either by conventional responses (verbal, written) or (ideally) by measured neural responses, and then make corrections and learn what worked and what didn't, and why. (5) Refine the process and develop a similar theory for the most effective ways to chain together notes in a melody, with the goal stated in #1.

[LOCKSUIT]

As in my tastes, that song means "advancements" but totally not dark at all. It's bright, light.

It's simple, too. No complex.

[LOCKSUIT]

You have to consider everything. Does the user want fast pace? A trumpet in there? A girl speaking!!? Dark bass? Complex tchno? Ear hurting raw? Choppy? About science? Then you begin to say..........wait..........this is language context based, I'll never model all these Rules. Exactly, stop trying to pin point it. There are rubs/vibes we like, but music is more than stimuli alone. It's a story. It helps you think. It gives you enthusiasm in your job.

[AndyGoode]

Happy songs don't cut it, I use advanced music. Happy songs are for happy times instead. :>

I also like some downer songs, no problem. But the OP is looking for ways to use AI to automatically create music that might be played in heaven, and I doubt that someone in heaven is going to be singing the blues and swearing about his wife making love to the garbage man. 

()
Buddy Guy_The Garbage Man Blues
rapitroy
Published on Aug 28, 2009

[HS]

(1) I believe the songwriter should first decide exactly which mood they want to convey: amount of power (4/4 rhythm is more intense than 3/4 rhythm, for example), clarity of ascent (I bIII is more obvious than I bVI), piquancy (in a major key, tastefully flatted notes like b3 and b7 are more piquant than 3 and 7), and so on. Both the chords and the scales used in the song are affected by this decision. (2) Select chords and scales that will match the decision in #1. (3) With the underlying theory of the song in place, then continue to match decision #1 with specifics such as instruments, amount of harmony, specific chains of notes, and so on. (4) Test the success of the resulting song on people, either by conventional responses (verbal, written) or (ideally) by measured neural responses, and then make corrections and learn what worked and what didn't, and why. (5) Refine the process and develop a similar theory for the most effective ways to chain together notes in a melody, with the goal stated in #1.

You could possibly elevate it one step further by playing several contrasting moods against each other. I think it provides a cool counterpoint effect, where the different attitudes emphasize one another.  Plus, such an arrangement prevents you from becoming desensitized to a continuous mood in a song.

For example, here you have a combination of surrender and perseverance (to me at least) :

[AndyGoode]

You could possibly elevate it one step further by playing several contrasting moods against each other.

Definitely. Some old "pastiche" groups that did that a lot were Yes, and Paul McCartney.

Without more information from vadim.it, we're now guessing at what exactly he had in mind: speed, instruments, mood, appeal to the masses vs appeal to sophisticates, etc. The impression I got from his description was something like either Indian classical music played on sitar (in which case no chords would be used), or majestic classical music with huge choruses of females singing (which could be very sophisticated and unappealing to the masses). New Age music and its subset Space Ambient music are other possibilities, in which case no explicit rhythm is used. Many possibilities. Anyway, his original question at least led to an interesting thread.

()
Heart of the Sunrise (2003 Remaster)
yesofficial
Published on Dec 11, 2014

[AndyGoode]

Andey, how do i share tracks like you did on AIVA for free?

Oops...my incredible track was actually Modern Cinematic, F major, Epic Orchestra

Just click on the "..." at the end of the line of a created song in the list provided, then Share, Link Sharing - Enable, then copy and paste the displayed link to your forum post.

OK, I just tried the Modern Cinematic for the first time and got this one:

https://beta.aiva.ai/publicPlayer?c=5d60b176ddbbbb3423058905

It's very convincing, though nothing sublime or striking. I played it in the background and forgot for a while that it was computer-composed, and my attention somewhat ignored it since evidently my mind subconsciously thought it was some unknown film music playing on YouTube in the background that wasn't of much interest to me. That's actually a good sign that a computer-generated composition succeeded. That's in contrast to that jazz song it created earlier, where part of me was shouting "Turn it off! Please turn that thing off!" It sounded like it had been trained on the jazz standard "Summertime," which is one of the few jazz standards I can't stand, and "Summertime" is very atypical of jazz compositions anyway, and the AIVA song was worse than "Summertime" due to its weird sustained instrument and chromatic note that was part of the melody for no good reason. (The human reason for using such a note is usually to transition into a nearby note, which the computer melody did not do.)

[LOCKSUIT]

Worked. I tried earlier, but following your instructions led me surely to the link needed.

Track: The pretty metal one, falling into the egyption abyss, on the way to glory god
https://beta.aiva.ai/publicPlayer?c=5d5b1cfc9fa808020acdda43