Artificial Intelligence in Music Education

This review of literature examines the historical development of artificial intelligence (“AI”), the general use of AI in music, and the theory and utility of using AI in music education. The review consisted of an examination of a wide range of journal articles and media reference material. AI is a software tool that analyzes large volumes of data, provides insight, learns from its mistakes and transforms many human centric activities to make them more accessible and less expensive. The review will encompass an examination of the common types of AI.  As the use of artificial intelligence in music education is still in its beginning phase, this review analyzes the literature with regard to the potential for utilizing AI to teach music, specifically percussion, while also reviewing literature that provides a critique of AI as not being well-suited to or useful for music education (because, among other reasons, of the fact that music education is an open-ended domain that encourages creativity and problem seeking, as opposed to problem solving). The review will discuss the literature that shows that the study of music performance may present unique opportunities for the application of AI to aid the student in perfecting the craft of musicianship, focusing on concrete criteria and skills such as movement and rhythm. This synthesis of current research is relevant to both data scientists and to music educators who may want to consider the use of AI in their pedagogical practice. This review will be useful to those interested in utilizing AI to develop or supplement their teaching or educational programs. It will highlight some of the drawbacks to developing and using AI as a pedagogical aid and examine potential usages for AI that are effective in teaching music. Finally, this review is catered towards educational program developers interested in creating a product that will aid in training young musicians in the technical musical skills required to perfect their musicianship as an adjunct and enhancement to in-person teaching.

Work Cited

Curtis Roads. Research in Music and Artificial Intelligence. ACM Computing Surveys, Vol. 17, Issue 2 (June 1985), 163-190.

“Front Matter.” Computer Music Journal, vol. 4, no. 2, 1980, pp. 1–1. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/3680074. Accessed 18 Sept. 2020.

Holland, S. (2000) Artificial Intelligence in Music Education: a critical review. In Miranda, E. (ed.) Readings in Music and Artificial Intelligence, Contemporary Music Studies Vol. 20. Harwood Academic Publishers, The Netherlands.

Karpov, N. (2020). Artificial Intelligence for Music Composing: Future Scenario Analysis. Technology Business and Future Foresight Degree Programme in International Business.

Marin, E. (2018). AI Could Be the Future Maestro of Music Education. Venture Beat.

Oke, S. A. (2008) A Literature Review on Artificial Intelligence. International Journal of Information and Management Sciences, Vol.19, No. 4, pp. 535-570.

Roels, Hans. “Using Open Source Music Software to Teach Live Electronics in Pre-college Music Education.” (2010).

West, Darrell M., and John R. Allen. “How Artificial Intelligence Is Transforming the World.” Brookings, Brookings, 28 Apr. 2020, www.brookings.edu/research/how-artificial-intelligence-is-transforming-the-world/.