Monkeys don’t make art. They can mimic the process, but without the element of consciousness and self expression (both crucial to any form of art or creative endeavor). AI is pretty much the same.
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why do people make music? what is superior?
AI will get to a stage that it can produce new and interesting music that people want to listen too… to the point, anyone can describe something they’d like to listen too, and it’ll be created on demand for them…
so ‘consumers’ will have a new choice, and even this process could be considered an art form.
( I think this is not really IF, rather when)
but this does not replace musicians in the same way as photography has not replaced painting.
musicians will make music because they enjoy the process.
others will want to watch musicians because its enjoyable to see someone create something… to share an experience.
I do wonder if though there will be a shift back to performance, and performance skills… and perhaps less focused on ‘production’
of course, you can argue that even in performance, we have seen many ‘aids’ introduced, so things are much easier to (learn to) play. but I think, as long as the performance can be seen to be coming from a (skilled) performer, then this will be entertaining - something people will want to see… over a robot/ai 
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The exact group isn’t that important. The only thing that is important is that there is some divisions of creatures that already can be made where people thing one group is superior to the other when it comes to creating more enjoyable art that they want to consume.
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not actually true, art brut is a thing.
Also, you were fine with “monkeys” - or at least higher apes. Here’s a painting by the leading Chimpanzee painter Congo. Sold for £14,400
The idea that “everyone” is going to agree what is “better” music is pretty optimistic though.
why would they suddenly do that?
currently people don’t even really agree what “in tune” means, that’s a
Also “AI” as it is now is not really AI and it’s only trained on art people already made isn’t it?
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If AI becomes superior in music making?
What is “superior”? That it will sound better? That compositions will be more interesting or complicated? That it’s cheaper to use than real musicians? This is a very complex issue flattened in a simple question, especially on such a subjective matter as on how “good” music is.
I would say “acoustic music” or “live music” (and with acoustic I mean real instruments like guitar, violin, drums, piano, singing etc.) always will be special because it is played by a real human. It’s a combination of art, performance, quality, character and interaction that makes live music so interesting. It’s a human thing and can’t be replaced or mimicked by AI, how good the AI will be in the end.
It’s slightly different for produced (electronic) music. There will be a point that AI will make very descent sounding music. Heck, all the recent autotune pop music already is very boring and minimal, it will be easy for AI to mimick that (It might already be in some cases). But the level of imperfection and randomness a human can add to it in combination with musical talent will still make it sparkle a bit more.
Personally I would be interested in (new) AI generated music, just to be able to hear what new technology is capable of. It might be used for mastering or as tools for composition (it already happens). But I don’t think it will ever fully replace real human music.
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this is commonly said… but I think it misses a couple of important points…
a) the AI people are referring to today, is not the ‘end product’, its still evolving.
also the learning approach people are talking about is only one strand of AI research, thats just getting a bit of the limelight at the moment.
so sure, perhaps in the short term this is true, in the mid term, it may not be.
b) aren’t we a sum of our experiences?
its oft said, there is no original art… we are bombarded with influences throughout our life… some obvious ones, like other music, but also experiences like walking in the park, reading a book, spending time with loved ones.
these culminate in our music/art.
so why AI learning from ( a much wider) selection of music, could be considered ‘influence’, its experience… and there is nothing to stop, AI developers relating music and painting, or other experiences.
as for emotions etc… its an interesting, thats also being researched in AI, with questions like what are emotions? (does getting closer to a goal make you happy?)
overall if you look at AI research, there is quite a bit more to it, than just listen to a ton of stuff and come up with something based on it.
also from its beginnings, AI has been very closely tied to philosophy, looking at what it is to be human… its what drew me to my interest in AI decades ago now.
also, the fear of AI, and its threats is also as old as AI research… its not just about robots taking over the world, or replacing our jobs. but also our fear of what it is to be human, why we are ‘special’
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You said that. I didn’t. 
Back to the original question, my answer is “No”.
Why would people stop self expressing?
It doesn’t matter if the outcome is good or not (or quantifiable). Art/creation covers a deep human need, totally independent from the outcome.
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No people won’t stop, but making music without AI is gonna be some kind of label like “dawless” or “vinyl only” etc… Other than that AI will spawn an entire generation of social media producers just like it did with DJ’s after it became so easy , no skills were requiered any more. In other words , there will be more scarcely dressed Russian bombshells who for some reason all make the most awesome Techno music …
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I think ”superior” AI in music will be leveraged mostly by the bigger players and at least early on by people wishing to rise quickly in the ranks. As a tool for us normals, sure, but we still enjoy making the sounds from scratch.
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I dont think you can blame AI for this trend, this has been the trend for a few decades now. AI is just another tool that helps the process.
also I wonder why, in music forums AI is usually portrayed almost exclusively as a bad thing.
already today, we are seeing it behind some very interesting new tools, that musicians can use/leverage. It’s quite possible AI will lead to new art forms e.g. it could be very interesting in the generative space.
music making is a very broad church,
its not just a band with a couple of guitarists, keyboard player and a drummer.
Im quite excited about what new possibilities might emerge.
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Interesting one, it could also be our fear that AI will teach us someday that we are not special at all…
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why don’t i stop music making when quite a lot of musicians & producers are already superior?
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thats one of the fears…
a bit like in the Middle Ages christianity rejecting the idea that the earth rotated around the sun, because we should be the centre of the universe.
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Music is the language of feelings.
AI has no feelings.
AI “art” if you wanna call it that is utter shit anyways.
Also, music is not sports so I don’t see why it would make any difference what anything/anybody else is doing.
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Yes , it doesn’t really matter if AI becomes superior… when punk came along it was mainly people with very limited musical skills…but a ton of energy to make up for it…music is more than only the production process … great music is energy, it’s subculture, it’s fashion, it’s political,…everything else will be generic fodder anyway weither it’s made by humans or AI…
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I say this as a pretty big fan of ChatGPT and AI visual art: I think AI music will be awesome and useful for specific use cases (soundtracks, background music), with the huge caveat that most people won’t be very good at it.
Generative art requires less talent, but much more taste, discretion, and patience. The best AI “musicians” will need to know a lot about music in order to make something good and interesting. I see it like electronic instruments: you don’t need to be a great drummer to use a drum machine well, but you need to know a lot about drums and rhythm to make something good.
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I would like to disagree. It is capable of combining the existing patterns in unpredictable ways, possibly creating something new. In the end, isn’t it what human creators do, too?
I highly recommend watching the AlphaGo documentary about a computer playing Go chess, and coming up with new ways of winning that haven’t been discovered for thousands of years this game exists.
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It’s just more on the pile of unadventurous music that sucks.
Created by AIs that were created by humans who are obviously not obsessed with music, otherwise they would be busy with making music themselves instead of having time for this BS.
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until we have true A.I : that is fully self aware autonomous entities, that dream, have desires are true life-forms, all A.I ‘art’ is just player piano. It’s a handle being turned.
Music, like all art, is defined by the intent of the creator. You might not like something, but its creator can tell you why they made it & what it means to them. Most of the time, this will resonate with other humans too. It will have meaning for them. This is the basis of all human creative art. Desires. Dreams. The unconscious mind. Intangible human interconnections & shared experiences.
Creation without intent, heck without even knowing what intent actually is, is not art.
Library music, simple underscoring & muzak beds, all that stuff, yeah A.I is here & coming on strong.
But it’s not going to replace human made music that people truly love & connect with.
I’m not saying we won’t get to that eventually with A.I but we’re a long long way from that in 2024. And when we do get there, whether or not these creatures will produce art or not will be way down the list of concerns: we’ll be too busy thinking about ethics…(in)human rights…the law…all sorts of big stuff. Not music
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