The uncanny muse : music, art, and machines from automata to AI / David Hajdu.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Hajdu, David, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Composition (Music)--Mechanical aids--History.

Composition (Music).

Electronic music.

Art and technology--History.

Art and technology.

Music--Automation.

Music.

Art--Automation.

Art.

Artificial intelligence--Musical applications.

Artificial intelligence.

AI art.

Genre:

Creative nonfiction.

Informational works.

Physical Description:

xii, 285 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm

Edition:

First edition.

Other Title:

Music, art, and machines from automata to AI

Place of Publication:

New York, NY : W.W. Norton & Company, [2025]

Summary:

"An acclaimed critic, journalist, and songwriter-musician tells the story of art's relation to machines, from the Baroque period to the age of AI. What does it mean to be human in a world where machines, too, can be artists? The Uncanny Muse explores the history of automation in the arts and delves into one of the most momentous and controversial aspects of AI: artificial creativity. The adoption of technology and machinery has long transformed the world, but as the potential for artificial intelligence expands, David Hajdu examines the new, increasingly urgent questions about technology's role in culture. From the life-size mechanical doll that made headlines in Victorian London to the doll's modern AI-pop star counterpart, Hajdu traces the fascinating, varied ways in which inventors and artists have sought to emulate mental processes and mechanize creative production. For decades, machines and artists have engaged in expressing the human condition--along with the condition of living with machines--through player pianos, broadcasting technology, electric organs, digital movie effects, synthesizers, and motion capture. By communicating and informing human knowledge, the machines have exerted considerable influence on the history of art--and often more influence than humans have been willing to recognize. As Hajdu proclaims: "before machine learning, there was machine teaching." With thoughtful, wide-ranging, and surprising turns from Berry Gordy and George Harrison to Andy Warhol and Stevie Wonder, David Hajdu takes a novel and contrarian approach: he sees how machines through the ages have enabled creativity, not stifled it--and The Uncanny Muse sees no reason why this shouldn't be the case with AI today."-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Is it alive?

Thinking machines

More could not be asked of mortal ingenuity

Even the kitchen sink

Spirituals of the city

This is music?

Brain automation

Everybody should be a machine

Patterns

Some more beginnings

It's like a robot

Paradise

A very curious relationship

Teaching and learning

Adversarial networks

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 233-258) and index.

ISBN:

9780393540833

0393540839

OCLC:

1437529009

Publisher Number:

90101742449