So then why did MIDI not replace musicians and conductors many decades ago? Why do we even bother thinking in terms of sheet music, or programs in terms of code?

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tjr 3 hours ago | parent [-]

It kinda sorta did. Decades ago, all music was played by live players. Today, there are lots of albums, lots of background music on television, radio, etc., that is made mostly or entirely using MIDI-controlled virtual instruments. No longer do you need to book an actual chamber orchestra for a little 30-second spot on some cooking show.

So those musicians are no longer getting booked for that bit of music. Instead, one person produces it in their home studio. But, there’s now an industry for creating software tools that support that workflow, and there are a lot more opportunities for such music than there used to be. The amount of music used in background spots on television is astounding.

Things changed. Some jobs diminished (studio players?) or went away altogether (music copyists?). But new work came into existence.

	▲	sublinear an hour ago \| parent [-]
		Yeah my point was that there's not much existing software within a business that's the equivalent of an ad jingle, unless you really split hairs and start counting excel macros or something. Will there be new software like that? Maybe, but you'll never hear about it. Not only because it's throwaway code, but because the best interface is probably no code at all. The chatbot will instead spin up a VM behind the scenes and never even show the code it generated unless you dig for it.