How does an AI-generated Christmas song stand up to festive favourite hits?

By Ann Yip

The use of artificial intelligence has exploded in 2023 - but I never quite understood the appeal of it until I was asked to create a Christmas number one using the technology.

I'm not a music producer and certainly not an experienced AI user, so I was a little lost at first.

But within a few hours, I had created several festive songs (whether they have chart-topping potential is another matter).

I began my AI journey by asking ChatGPT to "write me a Christmas number one". It effortlessly wrote a whole set of lyrics, but that was it. It couldn't then turn those words into music.

I found several websites that could generate decent tunes from a short description about the kind of genre and mood I wanted.

In the past, I have had to scroll through lists of royalty-free music for my videos, so I can see how incredibly useful this can be for content creators.

But I wasn't looking to spend too much time stitching together AI-generated tunes with AI-generated vocals.

The first site I came across with the capability to instantly create a song was SongR. But the beat and vocals sounded generic, not festive - pretty much what you would expect an AI-generated song to sound like.

It took a bit of searching, but Suno AI created the most convincing festive hits.

I asked it to create an "upbeat Christmas pop song", and within minutes, it "magicked" out a song with a festive tune, lyrics and vocals. It's not quite Mariah Carey or Ariana Grande but I'll let you be the judge of that:

There was also scope to use my own lyrics (AI-generated, of course).

Here's a more mellow version of my Christmas song:

The capabilities of AI today, not in the future, are huge - both incredible and frightening.

For example, I struggled to find an image to accompany this article, so I created one with AI.

During my search for an AI music generator, I also found YouTube videos of people creating "influencers" using AI. Imagine following someone on Instagram for months, only to find out they don't exist?

There were YouTubers teaching others how to create a whole channel with AI, using the tech to create your music, videos, logo, and banner for the channel.

Music producers can record themselves singing and they don't even have to sing well, because they can completely change their voice.

And I know people who already use AI to create picture-perfect versions of themselves on social media.

But there is a more serious side. The government is worried that AI-generated content could be used to spread fake information.

Fake photos of the Duke of Sussex and Prince of Wales together at the Coronation were shared more than 2,000 times on Facebook, according to fact-checking charity Full Fact.

And an image of Prime Minister Rishi Sunak pulling a pint of beer, which was edited to look worse, was viewed thousands of times on X.

The government says it is working to tackle AI deepfakes on social media and is supporting schemes to teach people how to spot fake content.

The 2023 Christmas number one will announced on Thursday, December 21.

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