‘Now And Then’, a new Beatles song, was released with the help of artificial intelligence; understand | Fantastic

‘Now And Then’, a new Beatles song, was released with the help of artificial intelligence; understand

It’s bound to touch the heart of any fan – from any generation and from any part of the planet. This week, the Beatles released a song written and sung by John Lennon, which was kept for more than four decades.

“The Beatles’ Last Song,” as it’s being called, has resurfaced with the help of technology. But the result, of course, would not be the same without the talent of four fabulous artists, who formed one of the greatest – or the greatest – band of all time.

It really is a new Beatles song. But what do you mean, “new”?

Englishman Oliver Murray is the director of a mini-documentary that tells the story behind the song “Now And Then”, released on Thursday (2).

“It’s melancholic, bittersweet. Just like many of the greatest Beatles songs,” said the director.

The band broke up in 1970. John wrote this song and made a home recording, on a K7 tape, a few years before he was murdered in 1980. And his wife, Yoko Ono, gave this tape to George Harrison.

“In 1994, Paul, Ringo and George met again and managed to produce two new songs, but they were unable to record a third, Now and Then, because John’s voice, in that song, was notwasn’t good enough”, explained Oliver.

“It wasn’t a recording to be released commercially, there was a lot of background noise: there was a television on, the microphone was in the wrong place, on top of the piano. And that was the biggest problem: the piano was too loud and disrupted John’s voice,” added the director.

But in 2022, director Peter Jackson was working on a documentary series about the Beatles, using old footage of the band. He and his team developed artificial intelligence technology that could separate the different instruments and voices that appeared in old videos.

“Paul McCartney asked Peter if this technology could be used to help with the song ‘Now And Then’. Peter said, ‘Yes, of course,’” Oliver said.

This technology is called “Machine Learning”, or “machine learning”, in Portuguese. As the name says, the machine learns to recognize and identify patterns.

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