The Responsible Digital Society research network held an “AI-ESC” with only AI-generated music, to highlight the opportunities and possibilities of current AI models. Participants were invited to create and submit an AI-generated song for their assigned country in the style of typical Eurovision Song Contest (ESC) entry. At the grand finale event on May 12 in the main auditorium at Kollegienhaus (Aula 003), a selection of these songs was played and the attendees voted for their favorite songs. While the votes were being tallied, a panel discussed the risks of AI for the music industry, arts and creativity.
15 Songs Representing 15 ESC Countries
The 15 "competing" countries at the AI-ESC were randomly selected from the particpating countries of the Eurovision Song Contest 2025. As well as the Big 5 (France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom) and Switzerland as the host, 9 further countries were randomly selected from the two semi-finals (4 from SF1 and 5 from SF2) as they will appear during the Eurovision Basel 2025.
Songs representing the following countries will participate in the AI-ESC Grand Finale: Croatia, Czechia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Iceland, Italy, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom.
How did we decide who will be a part of the Grand Finale?
Participants registered to be a part of the AI-ESC, and were randomly allocated to one of the 15 countries. 49 AI-generated songs were submitted to the AI-ESC organisers. After a compliance check, 1 song for each country is randomly selected to participate in the Grand Finale. No qualitative judgement of the submitted songs plays a role in selecting the finalists.
Contact
In order to reach out to the AI-ESC organizers, please send an email to responsible-digital-society@unibas.ch.
More details on the Responsible Digital Society (RDS) research network including information on how to join the RDS can be found here: rds.unibas.ch