AffectMachine-Pop: A controllable expert system for real-time pop music generation

TL;DR

AffectMachine-Pop is an expert system that generates retro-pop music aligned with real-time or preset emotional states, enabling flexible, affective music creation for emotion regulation and biofeedback applications.

Contribution

It introduces a controllable AI system for real-time affective music generation based on arousal and valence, addressing the black box issue of previous systems.

Findings

System successfully generates music at target emotional levels.

Listening study confirms effectiveness in matching desired arousal and valence.

Applicable for emotion regulation and biofeedback tools.

Abstract

Music is a powerful medium for influencing listeners' emotional states, and this capacity has driven a surge of research interest in AI-based affective music generation in recent years. Many existing systems, however, are a black box which are not directly controllable, thus making these systems less flexible and adaptive to users. We present \textit{AffectMachine-Pop}, an expert system capable of generating retro-pop music according to arousal and valence values, which can either be pre-determined or based on a listener's real-time emotion states. To validate the efficacy of the system, we conducted a listening study demonstrating that AffectMachine-Pop is capable of generating affective music at target levels of arousal and valence. The system is tailored for use either as a tool for generating interactive affective music based on user input, or for incorporation into biofeedback or neurofeedback systems to assist users with emotion self-regulation.