The quirky cool Songsmith technology from Microsoft.

Thanks to my Friend Mark for bringing this to my attention...I think he found the original piece on Pitchfork:(cut and pasted below)


If you follow internet memes, you've probably heard about a new computer application called Microsoft Songsmith, which, according to its maker, "generates musical accompaniment to match a singer's voice. Just choose a musical style, sing into your PC's microphone, and Songsmith will create backing music for you." You present it with a vocal, and the software analyzes the voice and adds chords, dinky-sounding digital instrumentation, and a beat. Microsoft launched this project in the last couple of weeks with this fabulously weird and dorky viral video/infomercial, which is the kind of thing you can watch over and over, losing yourself in its "Is this for real?" strangeness. One of the richest people in the world founded the company that put this out.

The beauty of Songsmith is that it comes close to producing something that almost, kinda, sorta, works, but winds up falling short, and thus coats everything it touches a with a thick layer of queasy surreality. Enterprising people with YouTube accounts have been applying it to a cappellas of well known songs.

Here is my personal favorite


0 Response to "The quirky cool Songsmith technology from Microsoft."