a short story by Kristofer G. Skaug

My Creator plays the viola on his spare time. With his string sextet, he recently played Brahms opus 36 for a gathering of friends. They played 3.54% of their notes out of tune, and the synchronicity was shaky at best. Yet the audience was visibly touched, and smothered the players in compliments and hugs.

Surely, I could do better? My brain is fast, my memory endless, my limbs precise and fast. I quickly worked out a set of sixteen new variations on the third movement theme, vastly more complex than Brahms’ original score. Using plug-in actuator extensions, I gently picked up all six instruments, and played. All the notes were of course in perfect tune and timing. Yet, as I scanned the audience for some token of appreciation, their faces remained oddly blank. A polite applause was all I got, after which people turned back to their chatter and drinks.

My Creator walked over to me and said:

“Are you really surprised? A robot’s superior virtuosity and intellect will impress nobody nowadays. But chiefly, this just wasn’t music. Not your fault, you’re not equipped for it. Music is magic between people. It is the agonizing grief or boundless joy of a composer, although he may be long dead, touching us today. It is the living breath and pounding hearts of the musicians, reaching out to each other and their audience. All of this echoes to me from my viola even now, like the waves of the sea forever will resound in a stranded seashell, reminding me of the magic we shared.

Take my viola part in this movement you improvised on. The entry in bar 10 is just a solid dotted half note’s worth of C, but its impact is enormous. It is like a shining beam of heat from my viola, connecting me to a glowing sun for three glorious seconds. This note lives in a treasure chest in my mind, together with dozens of other cherished musical passages. They make me laugh, dance, or weep just by recalling their existence. They remind me that, while my job is to build robots that are superior in so many ways, we humans still retain a few worthwhile advantages.

Without the human touch, the magic disappears from music. I’ve built some of the greatest AI’s in existence, but there are places you guys still can’t go. Primarily because we simply don’t need you to – we enjoy making this music ourselves.”

I hope to prove my Creator wrong one day. I’ll start with a deeper look into viola playing, maybe I can reach into that treasure chest.

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Author’s note: I fed this story to Google’s NotebookLM AI, and it generated an  animated “Deep Dive” podcast, summarizing and discussing the story and its connotations. You can hear the podcast here: