Calling all Biochar, Music-Loving Nerds!
I recently got the wild idea that maybe we could use music to help spread the word about biochar and environmental sustainability. Experimenting with Anthropic’s Claude to help with lyrics and a music generator to help produce each song based on the genre and feel I wanted for each, the following full length songs were created.
More on the how and why I created these songs songs below.
These are best heard in headphones or ear buds.
Contact Raymond here (solarimages at gmail.com)
First, the story of Sonoma Ecology Center (SEC) and the beautiful Sonoma Valley (Blues Style)
Black Gold in the Ground (Country Style)
The Good Earth (Afro Beats Style) Not Biochar Specific
Biochar’s Cookin’ Right (Reggae Style)
Biochar’s Amazing (Singer Songwriter Style)
Carbon Debt Biochar (Rock and Roll Style)
Carbon Debt Biochar (Singer Songwriter Style)
Biochar’s Cookin’ Right (Bluegrass Style)
Black Gold for the Forest Soil (Country Style)
More on How and Why:
I have been using Claude quite a bit the last few months to help with research and to explore ideas I have had, and the AI remembered ALL of this information and used it to help write the lyrics. I then fed the lyrics into the music generator with instructions and it created several versions of each song in whatever genre I chose.
In some cases I wrote the first few verses and the chorus (as in “Biochar’s Amazing”) and asked Claude to finish the lyrics, and in others it wrote the whole thing and I just edited here and there. While these songs are not perfect and there are a few flubs here and there, I thought they were good enough to plant the seeds for how we, as an industry, could use music to help educate people—especially young people—about this thing we are all excited about.
I would love to hear what you think and which, if any, you liked the best. Again, these are my very first attempts at using this new medium, and as with everything else about AI it will get better and better as the versions improve. I am, of course, concerned about how AI will affect musicians. But I do think if used as a creative assistant that many great songs could be co-written and co-produced using these technologies as partners. If you are a purist, you will HATE that. And I get it. We can all hate AI, or we can adopt and grow with it. I have chosen that latter.
Given I have always been an early adopter of technologies—for example I started using Photoshop I and a scanner in 1991 in my photography business and built my first website in 1995—in many ways AI is just the latest disruptive tech that will fundamentally change many lives, some for worse and some for the better.
Let me know if you think this educational approach has promise.
