5 AI Music Apps You Can Use as a Melody Generator
Apple acquired the London software company AI Music in early 2022, signaling a change to the way licensed music will be created in the future.
Shutterstock acquired Amper for a similar purpose back in 2020. The company's generative music algorithm would give content creators more audio to pick from, possibly at a lower cost.
In December 2022, several innovations hit the AI music scene, including image-to-sound technology of Riffusion and Harmonai's new Dance Diffusion models.
Then in January 2023, a major controversy surfaced when people started using a new diffusion service called DIFF-SVC to imitate pop singer Ariana Granda covering Motivation by Normani. The AI vocals were so realistic that fans thought it was a real song that had been leaked and confusion ensued. Have a listen here:
What does this mean for the future of the music industry? Will musicians be out of work or will these tools simply transform the way we create music?
We'd prefer to think that artificial intelligence can be used to empower musicians to create better music at a faster pace. This article we'll cover a variety ways to do that. Here are the AI music apps we'll be covering:
AudioCipher MIDI Plugin and Melody Generator
Defining AI Music
AI music refers to songs that were created, wholly or in part, with the aid of machine learning. The term is less commonly used to describe audio engineering practices, like the use of AI to automate audio processing.
Artificial intelligence and music was first introduced at ICMC, a computer music conference, in 1974. University departments are still devoted to the subject today, with masters and PhD theses periodically written on the topic.
The Best AI Music Apps for Music Creatives
Artificial intelligence is changing the way we make and listen to music. AI music apps are a great way to explore this new technology, and they might even help you create a masterpiece of your own!
Free software like Magenta Studio, MuseTree, Jukebox, and Tone Transfer are some of the most popular AI music creation tools today. We've also written about AI lyric generators and songwriting apps powered by artificial intelligence.
These AI models are trained on songs and audio across various genres. They draw influence from a dataset to create musical material in styles ranging from classical to pop and beyond.
AIVA Song Generator
AIVA is an AI-powered music generator that works in your internet browser, using deep learning algorithms trained on over 30,000 human compositions. The ai model has been trained for years to produce full arrangements in almost any style of music. You don't need to play an instrument or know anything about making music to use it. Just select your parameters, like the genre of music and emotion that you're going for. AIVA does the rest.
Once you find something you like, you can export the entire track as MP3, MIDI, or WAV stems. Music producers can reference the files as a starting point for their own music. Just be aware that the free plan is limited to three downloads per month. So while you can drill down pretty deep and customize things like key signature and tempo, you'll probably need a paid plan to make the most of the app.
AudioCipher MIDI Plugin & Melody Generator
AudioCipher is a melody generator that turns words into music. The MIDI plugin augments free AI music tools like OpenAI Musenet to emulate the experience of Dalle 2 and MidJourney. Instead of typing words to generate images, you can type words into AudioCipher to create melodies. Then pass them to an AI music tool and elaborate on the musical seed. Check it out!
Amper AI Music Generator
Amper is another powerful, browser-based music generator app. It delivers a similar feature set to AIVA, but with even more controls over the final output. Amper generates full songs based on the genre, mood and duration that you request. But more importantly, you get access to a dashboard where you can control the instruments that are kept in the mix. This way the audio files you export only include the content that you want.
You won't get MIDI files from Amper, which means you can't change as many details about the melody or virtual instrument. If you're looking for a similar type of app that generates AI music for free and exports to MIDI, we'll cover that next.
MuseNet MIDI Generator
MuseNet is one more browser-based app that generates music with artificial intelligence. Check out our article on how to use MuseTree, a free browser application that leverages MuseNet and provides a better user interface.
MuseNet specializes in MIDI output. You can control a few inputs like style, instruments, and length. But you'll need to select a musical theme from a list, so the algorithm has something to build upon. If you've already composed a MIDI idea, upload it directly to MuseNet and the app will elaborate on your song for you.
Play the MIDI output back right within your browser. If you like what you hear, you have the option to export it as an audio file or as MIDI. The benefit of exporting MIDI is that you can change the notes in your digital audio workstation.
One of the limitations with MuseNet is that they have a fairly limited collection of styles to choose from. Fortunately, with the option to seed your music, you'll always have ability to shape the kind of audio that comes out. As a workflow tool, it would be easier to have an app like this available right within the DAW. Hopefully in the future that option will become available!
Boomy AI Music Community
Boomy is an AI music generation community that lets users create original material and get paid for it on social media platforms.
The app's biggest differentiator is the option to distribute your music on streaming platforms like Spotify, TikTok, Youtube, and more. At the time of this post, Boomy users have reportedly created 5,690,684 songs, the equivalent to around 5.95% of the world's human music.
Visit the site to explore tracks that were uploaded by users. Whether the music the app creates is actually any good... that's for you to decide.
Soundful AI Music Creation
If you're looking to quickly generate music in a specific genre, Soundful might be a great option for you. Their diverse templates offer a starting point. Then you can generate similar tracks in the key signature and tempo of your choice.
The feature set is comparable to AIVA in many ways, but with a more modern looking interface resembling iTunes. Watch out for this company on the rise!
The Future of AI Music Apps
We're already beginning to see the effects of image generation tools like Dalle-2. Illustrators could be less likely to pick up character design gigs. Instead, they might be asked to fine tune something created with artificial intelligence.
On the other hand, artists now have extraordinarily powerful tools at their disposal, that can speed up their creative process tenfold. And the machines are still not perfect. There's an uncanny valley that only a human can close.
Like visual artists, musicians can harness the creative power of these music generators and take control, improving and perfecting the arrangement.
If you're someone who likes to experiment with plugins, there are a number of free tools available for you to explore. Our blog focuses on these free resources, to help you get started with your own music experiments.
Generative AI music software will continue to get more sophisticated in the coming years. Billions of dollars are being poured into research and development, which means the tools will improve dramatically before the end of this decade.
That being said, the best music comes deep from within someone's personality. It conveys feelings and thoughts that you didn't know could be expressed. I've yet to see anything created by a machine that achieves that level of artistry.
Artificial intelligence can be leveraged as a tool, to prototype ideas more quickly. It can produce new layers of audio for existing tracks that you created from scratch. Like any plugin or application, the only limit is your imagination.