Music is a powerful tool within video. There may be times when you or your students want to use music with footage. You might need an upbeat track to use as a ‘bed’ over a sequence of still photos? Or something a little punchy over a title slide to set a scene and grab a viewer’s attention? We can’t just use any track we desire and it’s likely that a copyright expired track may be a little dated. Despite recent changed to how copyright applies to education options are still limited.
So what can we as educators do? One option is to use music licensed under the creative commons scheme. This sits on top of traditional copyright but allows a more nuanced range of uses than a blanket ‘nope’. Sounds great, but anyone who’s spent hours trawling through CC licensed music will groan at you. The great stuff’s already everywhere and the majority of the rest is pretty awful. Even then you might find it isn’t the right length and may need editing to fit your footage. Finding music to fit can be a time consuming and frustrating exercise.
Jukedeck should make life much easier. It uses AI to create bespoke music from the criteria you supply. In around 20 seconds you can have a track created in the style you choose at the length you need. You can fine tune the instruments used, BPM and general feel. The music is royalty free, which means you have no issues using it for educational purposes. Signing up for a free account gives you 5 free downloads a month, after that it’s $7 a track.
The private beta has already seen the likes of the Natural History Museum and Google using it. Jukedeck launched this week at TechCrunch Disrupt London’s Startup Battlefield.
More info on how it works – http://techcrunch.com/2015/12/07/jukedeck/
