Art vs Artist VS Art vs Algorithm: An Exploration into how we engage with Music

For the past 19 years, music has been a constant force in my life. I grew up classically trained in Carnatic music (South Indian classical) and Western piano, eventually branching out into jazz, forming a rock band with friends, and most recently, singing on a South Asian fusion a cappella team. From performing at Carnegie Hall for both Jazz vocals and piano, to delivering a 3+ hour debut Carnatic vocal concert, I’ve grown to take great solace in the music I create and share with the world. Needless to say, I have been consuming and creating music my whole life, and it’s my primary way of connecting with myself and with other people.

At the same time, as a creative technologist, I’ve always been fascinated by the intersection of AI and creative output and how we can harness the power of technology to foster human connection and creativity. This led me to USC's Iovine and Young Academy, where I’m currently pursuing a B.S. in Arts, Technology, and the Business of Innovation and a minor in Computer Science. In high school, I researched how AI-generated music could be used for music therapy and mental health, and eventually built a neural network to generate emotionally congruent music. Since then, the capabilities and scale of music generation models have grown exponentially, with companies like Suno, Udio, and Google's MusicLM now producing music that is increasingly indistinguishable from human-made compositions.

And yet… I find that I just don’t care.

I currently serve as a University Ambassador for Suno, the most popular AI music generation platform on the market. However, I’m scared to admit that I’ve never actually used the tool. I haven’t generated a single track, nor have I listened to the ones shared with me. This is especially strange because I consider myself deeply musically curious. Most days, I seek out something new to listen to, falling into rabbit holes of niche sounds and micro-genres and impulsively building playlists to capture what I’ve discovered with no intention of returning to them anytime soon. As a music enthusiast, I’m constantly craving new sounds and musical experiences, and what better way to discover a new and completely original sound than with AI?

Source: suno.com

Why don’t I care?

To help understand this apathy, I started thinking about the concept of “separating art from artist,” which essentially justifies the continued consumption of an artist’s work without supporting the person

behind it. Whether it’s Kanye West, Chris Brown, or Brendan Urie, many have debated whether or not listening to their music implicitly supports them as individuals and if it is morally okay to do so. However, for example, despite Kanye West’s controversies in recent years, his Spotify monthly listener count has hovered around 60 million, proving that majority of his fans still engage with his music, regardless of his public persona. This begs the question: if people have no trouble separating the art from the artist and are willing to appreciate and value music for what it is, what is stopping them from embracing and enjoying AI-generated music? After all, if we isolate the output, the music itself, what difference does it make if the source is a “problematic human” or a machine learning model capable of generating original music?

To better understand this, I helped organize a survey in collaboration with USC’s Art.I.ficial Club and Stanford’s Entertainment Lab that asked Gen Z participants about their thoughts on AI in creative fields. When asked how important it was that music be made by a human rather than AI, out of 106 responses, 51.9% rated it a 5 (most important), and 31.1% rated it a 4, showing that 83% of respondents cared deeply about human involvement in music creation.

I can’t say the results really surprised me, as they reflected my own subconscious feelings. Nonetheless, the responses made it clear that it’s not just about the song. It’s not about the artist either. It’s about a secret third thing: the creative process. We value the human creativity that goes into making music. The raw talent. The personal experiences, cultural identities, heartbreaks, obsessions, and inspirations that shape a piece of music into something uniquely expressive. Looking back, even my initial obsession with music generation stemmed less from the music itself and more from my fascination with the technology and the human ingenuity it took to even build such capable models.

To dig deeper, we also asked open-ended questions in our survey about how Gen Z views AI’s role in the creative process. People’s responses show that while Gen Z is okay with using AI as a tool, we are hesitant to use it as a creator. As one person put it, “I would not use AI when it came to the creation/pre-production of the art/music, as it would make it feel less authentic.” Another added, “I would personally never give up any aspect of music writing to AI… it would devalue anything I created.” We want the soul of the song, its composition, emotion, and voice, to come from us. We don’t see AI as inherently bad, but also don’t feel emotionally connected to music made without genuine human input, explaining my own hesitance.  These tools are optimized for probability, not honesty.

However, this doesn’t mean AI-generated music has no value. In the right hands, it can serve as a jumpstart for new creators or a democratizing tool for people who lack access to expensive production software or training. It can help indie artists generate instrumentals, streamline workflows, or even invent entirely new genres by remixing influences in unprecedented ways. The key here is that all of these use cases still keep human creativity at the center.

Gen Z wants music that feels authentic, not just audibly convincing. We are skeptical of automation without authorship and gravitate toward art that is shaped by lived experience, not just training data. Perhaps that’s why, despite the impressive tech and catchy melodies, I still haven’t clicked “generate.” I believe that even with the ongoing advancements in music generation, I and many in my generation will likely keep turning back to music made by humans. Not because it is objectively better than what AI could create, but because it directly connects to the human in us.

Source: Stanford E-Lab x USC Art.Ificial sruvey