Creation beyond boundaries: Aiode's Virtualised AI Musician

Cousins and Co-founders, Idan and Blue on Building Virtual Musicians That Enhance Rather Than Replace Human Creativity

The future of music production may not lie in automation, but in augmentation. That's the philosophy driving Aiode, where cousins Blue and Idan are developing AI musicians that work alongside human creators rather than replace them. Drawing from their unique blend of musical expertise and technical innovation, they've created a platform that captures the nuanced interaction between producers and session musicians, while ensuring artists benefit from every virtual performance.

Some background information about Aiode:

Aiode was founded with a singular vision: to empower artists’ creative exploration through the power of artificial intelligence. Inspired by Aoede, the Greek muse of song and voice, Aiode merges deep passion for music and advanced technology to create innovative tools that push the boundaries of artistic expression.

Musicians, AI developers, music producers, and mathematicians came together to drive three years of intensive research, united by this shared vision. This collaboration resulted in cutting-edge, ethically trained AI models that ensure fair compensation for contributing artists. These models, known as virtualized musicians, capture the essence of real musicians, meticulously recording their unique styles and embedding them into Aiode's proprietary AI architecture.

Aiode offers a diverse range of virtualized musicians, enabling seamless collaboration and dynamic music creation experiences. Aiode's platform allows users to work with these virtualized musicians who adapt and enhance their creations, providing endless possibilities for innovation and creativity. This seamless integration of technology and artistry ensures that every artist, whether a bedroom producer or a world-renowned composer, can explore new creative horizons.
As Aiode continues to expand, it's commitment to fostering a vibrant community of musicians and creators remains steadfast. Aiode ensures that technology enhances rather than replaces human artistry, standing at the forefront of AI-driven music innovation.

Thanks for taking the time out to talk today, let's start off with a bit of background about each of you. What made you want to get into the Music AI space. What experiences led to the founding Aiode?

BLUE: For me, it was really a no-brainer because I started my life in New York. I'm the son of a percussion player, who is even pretty famous — and has two Grammys to his name. Through his amazing career, he took me to all kinds of gigs and concerts, from underground jazz festivals to Madison Square Garden. I fell in love with music from the start and eventually became a producer myself. I mainly play drums and keys, so that's the musical side.

On the other hand, I love building things from scratch. On the tech side, that meant writing code from a very young age, and later, working with AI as it became available. The combination of these two passions was a no-brainer for me. Understanding the challenges that producers face and having the know-how to solve them really connected for me. Plus, I have this guy as a cousin, so...

IDAN: So as Blue mentioned, we're cousins, which made it very easy for us to get to know each other and start the actual business 🙂 As for my background, since we both come from a very musical family, it includes playing the piano from a young age. I was always drawn to music, and love the space — it's fascinating to me. The rise of AI within creative workflows, particularly in music, was something that I found very interesting. Additionally, much like Blue, my background also includes mathematics. I used to study physics and mathematics and then moved on to law and business administration.

I'm a lawyer by trade, and I used to practice mainly tech and commercial law, so I guess the combination of our backgrounds in tech, music, mathematics, and law made it, as Blue called it, a no-brainer for us to start some kind of venture within this space. Once we started raising our initial funds, everything took off from there.

Tell me more about your team and how you met?

BLUE: So, I guess the cool thing is that Idan’s my cousin, so it starts from that. It's a perfect fit, and as for the rest of the team, who are just amazing — whether in tech, AI, mathematics, marketing, product or music — we obviously have a bunch of those.

We looked for the best, and I'm happy to say that we found them.

IDAN: 100%. Maybe I'll even add to what Blue just said: I think the space of music AI is so intriguing that a lot of really high-quality personnel are drawn to it simply because it is cutting-edge. Working on something as exciting as a virtual musician made it relatively easy to attract top talent.

What were some of the biggest challenges you faced during the development of Aiode, and how did you overcome them?

IDAN: I think part of the challenge was that when we started Aiode a few years back, AI wasn't as common as it is today. This meant that we first had to create a technology that, while now robust, needed to be long-lasting. We aimed to create a technology that enhances workflows and improves the lives of producers. We see a lot of products out there that we call 'music buttons,' where you insert a prompt - usually in text format, and then an entire song comes out. One of the early challenges, and I give Blue a lot of credit for this, was developing a technological architecture that could truly mimic the micro-decisions of an actual musician. This was essential for enabling music creators to work with better tech and much more intuitive workflows.

Another challenge we faced was acquiring data sets. To build a long-lasting company with a sustainable business model, we needed a plan to continuously gather more ethically sourced data to train our models. Collaborating with musicians and training their AI virtual counterparts with their consent meant that as we added more musicians to the platform, our data set grew, improving our models over time.

So, I think those were the two biggest challenges. Blue, can you think of anything else?

BLUE: Startups are inherently challenging, but fortunately, our funding process went quite smoothly and quickly. People were really supportive of our idea, and we're pleased to have strong investors backing us. We have amazing investors, for sure.

How do you envision Aiode being integrated into existing music production workflows, and what are the potential benefits for artists, producers and the music industry as a whole?

BLUE: I think the cool thing about this is that we're really not changing the workflow of creating music at all. We're basing this on the way music producers and creators like to work.

I think that differs from many products coming out right now, which are trying to replace the entire creative workflow. When you think about it, you get the same workflow as working with a musician in the studio — an actual human musician, which is not technological but humane and creative. You talk to them, let them listen to the song, get their input, and make revisions. That's the type of workflow we aim to replicate within our software.

The same goes for music producers. We’re now in a world where you can do everything digitally, so-called 'in the box,' and you can work on a train and produce a full-length song from your laptop. We combine the benefits of working with something as human-like as possible with the advantages of a digital environment. This gives you the best of both worlds.

In terms of benefits, for creators, it's really about thinking more creatively and less technically. It’s not just an efficiency boost for a fraction of the cost, but the ability to take an idea and work in a more human and creative way, ultimately creating the song they envision. This empowers them and, at the same time, empowers musicians.

Musicians now have the opportunity to work with us at Aiode and turn their career into an asset, gaining an additional revenue stream. By gaining another revenue stream based on their abilities, they can focus more on the music they want to create (rather than the jobs that pay the most) while gaining more exposure.

IDAN: Our hope is that as we evolve, Aiode becomes a sort of discovery platform for up-and-coming artists. For example, imagine you're a piano player situated in Australia. There's a very likely chance you would never get exposed to the Japanese market, for instance.

Suddenly, a Japanese producer might use your virtual version, like what they hear, and even invite you to their recording studio to work with the real you. We believe Aiode can help new artists gain exposure — not only on the musician side, but also for producers. If you're an up-and-coming producer, like an 18-year-old kid producing music in their bedroom, you could suddenly work with the best musicians for your project at any given time, anywhere around the world.

Are there any accepted "truths" about AI's role in music creation that you disagree with based on your discussions with musicians? What's your contrasting viewpoint and evidence?

IDAN: I'll tell you this: I'm not sure there are any overall accepted truths. However, I will state that along the way, we've encountered many misconceptions about the role of AI within the creative space. What I mean is that when we first started talking with musicians and music producers — I'm talking two or three years ago — we sensed some hesitation toward the emerging tech.

Questions like, 'Is AI going to replace me?' came up often. There were concerns about whether creativity would suffer if everyone was training the same type of models. Would music become stagnant? Would it evolve?

Our position, or our contrasting viewpoint on these assumptions, is that the right products are those that enhance the creativity of creators rather than replace them. We believe creative individuals care deeply about their creative process. If you provide them with tools that enhance that process, rather than replace it — unlike those music-generating buttons we mentioned earlier, where you insert a text prompt and get an entire song — then you support creativity. By allowing music creators to work with virtual musicians, instruct them, and add new layers to existing songs, we enhance creativity. Simultaneously, we allow musicians to model their virtual versions and create a revenue stream from that. We're not here to replace musicians; we're here to help them capitalize on their careers while providing music creators with better tools.

How do you see the future of AI in the music & the creative industries evolving in the next 5-10 years? Where do you envision Aiode in that future? 

IDAN: To be honest, I think it's a bit presumptuous to predict what will happen within the next five to ten years, simply because the technology is evolving so rapidly.

We see constant changes and evolving legislation in response to the rapid development of AI. So, ten years down the road might be too far for me to make a wild guess, but I can share what I hope the future will look like. I hope we see more companies in the field working to enhance creativity rather than replace it entirely.

We need to build more tools that integrate within existing workflows that have already proven effective for creators. At the same time, it's crucial to create long-lasting business models and economics. This means more companies need to license their training data and develop revenue-sharing models with copyright owners so that we can all, by the way, train better models.

If every AI music company in the space trains its models on the same open-source data, the models will end up sounding the same. Maybe Blue can elaborate on that point specifically, but I think it's crucial to develop solutions that allow companies like ours to train their models without taking too big of a financial hit, while also creating fair remuneration models for copyright holders.

BLUE: Yeah, 100%. Gathering large data sets and training the same type of music on the same platform — what we call ״music buttons״ — although it could be interesting for the general market, to be able to have an idea and make it come to life in some way, it has major disadvantages.

For those who really want to be involved in the creative process and control the results, we need to train models on specific datasets, tailored to the goal in hand. 

If more people contribute creative work to the music we’re making and different types of creative individuals are involved, that’s the workflow we believe in, and one that will allow companies like ours to develop more complex models catering various needs.

IDAN: I’m going to follow up with another point that just came to mind. It may not directly involve the future of AI music, but I was going to say that we need legislators to understand that what we need is a legislation that supports innovation and incentivises frameworks that reward companies taking the right path, in terms of artist and copyright holders’ remuneration. We need legislators to start recognising that AI is here to stay and is set to revolutionize industries. Our laws need to be compatible with AI companies like ours.

What advice would you give to aspiring entrepreneurs looking to make a career in the Music AI space?

IDAN: The first thing that comes to mind is that when you're talking with artists, these are not financiers or doctors. You need to focus on their creative aspects. When you build a product, make sure it speaks to them and empowers their creativity. Understand the state of mind they are in.

You need to appeal in such a manner that makes the end users — the creators — believe and understand that we are creators as well. We’re not here just to make a profit. Obviously, we’re not a non-profit company, but we are building a product that should and will enhance the lives of individual creators.

At the same time, Blue and I spent months speaking with industry leaders, musicians, music producers, and AI experts to understand what type of product can facilitate and enable the combination of all these fields. The main point I want to highlight is that the music and creative industries as a whole are a totally different ballgame.

You need to understand your audience, how to market it, and what the messaging should be. You need to be on the right side of the map. Just to add quickly, the right side of the map means we're not going to replace musicians. We’re going to work with copyrighted materials and integrate within the existing workflows of music producers, while offering remuneration for musicians who contributed to the platform.

BLUE: Elaborating on what Idan is saying, I really believe that’s the main point here. When trying to enter the music AI entrepreneurial space, another important aspect to consider is working with people who have a passion for the field.

Surrounding yourself with passionate individuals — especially when it comes to music and other creative aspects — is crucial. People with passion will do everything for the startup, looking 10 years into the future and paying attention to the details to ensure the product is perfect for all types of users, whether professionals or amateurs. This is really important when dealing with creative things like music, and that’s why the vast majority of our team is also well-versed in music.

IDAN: You know, when you mention that, maybe one other thing that comes to mind is surrounding yourselves with the right type of design partners and advisors who understand the music industry. When we got accepted into Abbey Road Red, we recognised the immense potential of that collaboration because they know the industry. They are the leaders in the field.

They understand it and get where we’re coming from. They enabled us to really refine our overall plan, go to market strategy and so on.

So I think that’s good advice.

Is there anything else you'd like to share about Aiode or your personal journeys that we haven’t covered?

IDAN: I have one cool thing to mention: we’re going to open our closed beta soon. So if people want to try it, they can go to Aiode.com and get early access. I think this is the most important stage of our development as a company. We’ve worked very hard to get here.

I believe we have something that no one else has out there. The product itself is designed to enhance the producers’ experience, just like you said. But the most important part is the users.

Once we have a group of people telling us what’s wrong with the product, what can we improve on, and what the next steps should be, we’ll be able to provide our users with the exact product they’re looking for.

BLUE: Yeah, maybe just adding to that, we’re very open to both criticism and positive or reinforcing feedback. We’d love to hear from anyone in this space. We will take the time to talk to anyone, whether a musician, a music creator, a producer, or an AI enthusiast.

We always enjoy talking with more individuals from the industry. We’d be happy to answer any questions. And, as we mentioned, the beta will be open soon, so sign up.

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