Google announced on Wednesday that it’s adding a music-generation feature to the Gemini app. The company is using DeepMind’s Lyria 3 music-generation model to power the feature, which is still in beta.

To use the feature, you’ll describe the song you want to create, and the app will generate a track along with lyrics. For instance, you could ask Gemini to create a “comical R&B slow jam about a sock finding its match,” and the app will generate a 30-second track along with cover art made by Nano Banana. — Read More

Czech ice dancers Kateřina Mrázková and Daniel Mrázek made their Olympic debut on Monday, an unfathomable feat that takes a lifetime of dedication and practice. But the sibling duo used AI music in their rhythm dance program, which doesn’t break any official rules, but serves as a depressing symbol of how absolutely cooked we are.

As Mrázek spun his sister in a crazy cartwheel-lift-sort-of-move that made them look superhuman, one of the NBC commentators mentioned in passing, “This is AI generated, this first part,” referring to the music. Somehow, that admission is even more baffling than the gravity-defying tricks that the siblings showed off on the pressure of Olympic ice. — Read More

Today, ElevenLabs launches The Eleven Album, a landmark musical release created in collaboration with world-class artists and powered by Eleven Music, our model for generating fully original, studio-quality compositions.

Spanning rap, pop, R&B, EDM, cinematic scoring, and global sounds, the album brings together GRAMMY-winning legends, chart-topping producers, and next-generation creators to explore what’s possible when artists and AI create together. — Read More

Google is rolling out a beta experience that lets you hear real-time translations in your headphones, the company announced on Friday. The tech giant is also bringing advanced Gemini capabilities to Google Translate and expanding its language-learning tools in the Translate app.

The new real-time headphone translations experience keeps each speaker’s tone, emphasis, and cadence intact, so it’s easier to follow the conversation and tell who’s saying what, Google says. The new capability essentially turns any pair of headphones into a real-time, one-way translation device. — Read More

According to Billboard’s “Country Digital Song Sales” chart, the No. 1 song in the U.S. is “Walk My Walk” by Breaking Rust—an artist that was created by artificial intelligence (AI).

This is a new development in the music industry as it is the first time an AI-created song has reached the top of the charts.

There have long been concerns about the use of generative AI in creative sectors. Discourse about this came into the fold a few years ago following protests in Hollywood from the writer and actor guilds, which took place shortly after the public release of ChatGPT, and concerns that came in tandem with the new technology and its implications.

… As the AI revolution continues to impact creative industries, it could be that more AI-generated artists continue to pop up in the charts, with pushback likely to be inevitable. — Read More

OpenAI is working on a new tool that would generate music based on text and audio prompts, according to a report in The Information.

… One source told The Information that OpenAI is working with some students from the Juilliard School to annotate scores as a way to provide training data. — Read More

Moises’ AI stem separation technology extracts Whitney Houston’s vocals from original recordings, enabling live orchestral performances across a seven-city tour

Whitney Houston’s voice moved generations, and through a collaboration between The Estate of Whitney E. Houston, Primary Wave Music, and Park Avenue Artists, it has now returned to the stage. The Voice of Whitney: A Symphonic Celebration, which debuted in August 2024, brings Houston’s legendary vocals to concert halls across US cities. The concert transports fans into Houston’s musical world, as live orchestras perform alongside Houston’s vocals and rare footage. Audiences experience the power of Houston’s voice in a live setting, with a breathtaking fusion of technology and artistry that celebrates her enduring legacy. — Read More

What if you could listen to music or a podcast without headphones or earbuds and without disturbing anyone around you? Or have a private conversation in public without other people hearing you?

Our newly published research introduces a way to create audible enclaves – localized pockets of sound that are isolated from their surroundings. In other words, we’ve developed a technology that could create sound exactly where it needs to be.

The ability to send sound that becomes audible only at a specific location could transform entertainment, communication and spatial audio experiences. — Read More

In late 2013, the Spike Jonze film Her imagined a future where people would form emotional connections with AI voice assistants. Nearly 12 years later, that fictional premise has veered closer to reality with the release of a new conversational voice model from AI startup Sesame that has left many users both fascinated and unnerved.

“I tried the demo, and it was genuinely startling how human it felt,” wrote one Hacker News user who tested the system. “I’m almost a bit worried I will start feeling emotionally attached to a voice assistant with this level of human-like sound.”

In late February, Sesame released a demo for the company’s new Conversational Speech Model (CSM) that appears to cross over what many consider the “uncanny valley” of AI-generated speech, with some testers reporting emotional connections to the male or female voice assistant (“Miles” and “Maya”). — Read More