More than two decades ago, I stood in a recording studio in Johannesburg, hearing about my surprising SAMA nomination. The South African Music Award for Best Single was within reach—a misplaced sense of validation, but still elated.
Today, as I listen to AI-generated tracks that could easily have taken that award, I'm struck not by disappointment, but by wonder. We've reached a pivotal moment where artificial intelligence doesn't just mimic music—it creates it with sophistication that would have been pure science fiction in the early 2000s.
The question isn't whether AI-harvested music is good enough anymore. It's whether we're ready for what comes next.
The Great Convergence
The numbers tell a remarkable story. About 60% of musicians are using AI for tasks like mastering, composing, and even generating artwork for their projects. More strikingly, 82% of listeners cannot distinguish AI from human compositions. Sony's "Daddy's Car," generated by their Flow Machines AI, convinced most listeners it was human-composed.
The Beatles' last "new" song "Now And Then" was created using AI to bring an unreleased demo recording by the late John Lennon to life. When it won a Grammy for Best Rock Performance in February 2025, it marked the first time AI-assisted music received such recognition.
This isn't just technological novelty—it's the democratisation of musical genius.
AI as Creative Partner
The most profound shift isn't AI replacing musicians—it's amplifying human creativity. Electronic music leads AI adoption with a 54% rate, followed by hip-hop at 53%. These genres, built on technological innovation, naturally embrace AI's possibilities.
AI platforms can analyse a song's key changes and chord progressions and even suggest melodies based on what the musician wants to create. Many musicians have overcome their creative blocks with the help of AI - I hope my producer-friend Rob takes head.
Consider the workflow transformation: what once required expensive studio time and session musicians can now be achieved on a laptop. AI-powered virtual instruments recreate everything from vintage Wurlitzers to entirely original soundscapes, giving independent musicians access to rich sonic palettes that once required expensive hardware.
The Business Revolution
AI-generated music is expected to boost the music industry's revenue by 17.2% in 2025, with the overall AI music market projected to reach $38.71 billion by 2033.
2025 will mark a pivotal moment in the music industry, with social media platforms forecasted to overtake traditional streaming services as the primary source of revenue. 74% of internet users have used AI to discover or share music, reshaping not just what we listen to, but what gets created.
Essential AI Tools for Independent Artists
Today's independent musicians can leverage professional-quality AI tools to compete with major label productions:
Music Creation: Suno and Udio generate complete songs from text prompts. Beatoven.ai creates royalty-free background music perfect for content creators. AIVA excels at orchestral and cinematic compositions.
Voice & Vocals: ElevenLabs offers professional voice cloning with minimal audio samples. Kits.AI provides ethical, artist-approved vocal models with compensation systems.
Production & Mastering: LANDR and eMastered deliver automated mastering services. Splice's AI-powered sample discovery helps find perfect sounds instantly.
Marketing & Distribution: Amper Music creates custom tracks for social media content. AI-driven platforms like RepostNetwork optimise release strategies based on streaming data patterns.
Collaboration Tools: BandLab's AI assists with real-time global collaboration, while Soundtrap integrates AI-powered instruments and effects.
These tools level the playing field, allowing bedroom producers to achieve sounds that once required major label budgets.
The Ethical Crossroads
Yet this revolution isn't without shadows. 77% of people are concerned that AI-generated music doesn't appropriately credit the original artists. 90% believe AI companies should ask permission before using copyrighted music for training data.
The Velvet Sundown, with more than 1 million monthly listeners on Spotify, is raking in thousands of dollars—except they're entirely AI-generated. For struggling human artists, this reality stings. 65% of musicians believe the risks of AI outweigh the benefits, primarily due to concerns about replacement and unpaid usage of their work.
What AI Still Can't Touch
Despite AI's remarkable capabilities, fundamental aspects remain distinctly human. When it comes to creativity, we are still miles away from being able to compose or write music like a human composer or songwriter.
Emotional authenticity, cultural context, lived experience, and the ineffable spark that connects deeply with audiences—these remain human domains. AI excels at pattern recognition and technical execution, but struggles with conceptual leaps and emotional depth that define memorable music.
The Path Forward
At Kits AI, they've taken a firm stance on this. Every voice model they offer is fully licensed and artist-approved, ensuring creators are credited and compensated fairly. This ethical approach suggests a sustainable model where AI enhances rather than exploits human creativity.
By experimenting with AI artists can: Save time and money, reach wider audiences, explore new creative possibilities. But they must preserve the human elements that make music emotionally resonant and culturally meaningful.
The Verdict: Evolution, Not Revolution
Would AI-generated music have won my SAMA category in the early 2000s? Absolutely not—the technology didn't exist. Could it win today? Yes, maybe. But that's not the right question anymore.
The real question is: How do we harness this capability to amplify human creativity rather than replace it?
Art is art, and the technology of the last 100 years has enabled artists to achieve extraordinary creative feats. AI is now part of that continuum, with a much more powerful toolset.
The future isn't AI versus humans—it's AI with humans, creating sounds we couldn't imagine separately. Today's AI tools give every creator potential to achieve sounds that would have required industry backing just years ago.
That SAMA nomination taught me that recognition matters, but creation matters more. The age of AI music has arrived. The question isn't whether we're ready—it's how we'll rise to meet it.
Last week, I received a message from a young producer in Cape Town. "I used AI to create my first album," he wrote. "But I added my grandmother's voice singing traditional Xhosa melodies over the AI-generated arrangements. The result sounds like nothing I could have made alone—and nothing AI could have made without me".
Rob listened to his track. It was hauntingly beautiful. Electronic textures that would have taken months to program, seamlessly woven with ancestral voices that carried centuries of cultural memory.
As I reflected on my own SAMA nomination all those years ago—the late nights in expensive studios, the vocal coach, the painstaking process of layering every sound by hand—I realised something profound.
The tools have changed. The heart of music hasn't.
Perhaps that's the real revolution: not AI replacing human creativity, but, AI finally giving every dreamer access to the symphony in their soul.