After AR Rahman uses AI for his new song, Kavita Krishnamurthy says she feels 'scared' over 'AI misuse' in the industry

At a time when artificial intelligence has swept across technology, it has also seemed to have entered the music industry in ways that have enabled many to produce the sound of musical artists through machine learning.

After creating waves across the Western industry, the advent of AI has now entered India. It recently became the talk of the town after Academy Award-winning composer AR Rahman, in his latest venture, featured the voices of late singers with the use of artificial intelligence.

In his album from the Rajinikanth starrer Lal Salaam, Rahman brought back the voices of well-known singers Bamba Bakya and Shahul Hameed, marking the first time a music professional has used an AI voice model in India.

While it has stirred a hot debate followed by criticism and concerns among fans, legendary singer Kavita Krishnamurthy has also shared her views, stating that she feels scared about the misuse of AI in music.

Kavita Krishnamurthy on the misuse of AI in music

In an interaction with news agency ANI, Kavita Krishnamurti spoke about an individual’s deep personal connection with music, adding that one should be able to pass an emotion to the listener or the audience.

“Technology is okay, but I do feel scared of artificial intelligence. Unless it’s used for medicine, science, or something like that, for music, when you think of AI, I feel very scared, and I feel that can be a lot of misuse,” she said.

She went on to state that AI can enable anyone to create a song using her voice, further questioning whether it will carry the same emotions.

“Take my voice sample and get AI to sing it in Arabic, French, Russian, Japanese, or Chinese. I wouldn’t be happy to hear a song of mine in Chinese for which I have not worked hard and sung myself. Because it’s Chinese, it’s fine; it’s my voice, but do you think it will have the same emotion? My question is: What happens? The song is supposed to have emotion. The main part of singing is emotion in any form, whether it is a spiritual song or a happy or sad one. If you are not able to pass the emotion, you are not an artist, the singer said.