When I first watched that video, I laughed. It was a fairly funny comedy act poking fun at Microsofts quirkiness. I showed it to a friend and then out of curiosity, followed the link at the end of the video because it looked legit. http://research.microsoft.com/songsmith

It was a well done website so at that point, I was thinking to myself, Microsoft is playing a prank and I am going to feel like a fool for falling for it (though I wasnt sure why they would be pranking people). There is no way they’d spend time and effort developing a program to help individuals write corny theme songs for commercials. But then I saw there was a download. Out of curiousity, I downloaded and installed. Low and behold, it was a legit program.

This is definitely something worth checking out. There is a demo on the website. Microsoft Songsmith does exactly what it claims. You sing a song and then it analyzes what you sang and adds background music to fit your tune. It works surprisingly well. It was fun to write a short verse and email it to friends, despite my lack of singing skills.

As strange and unbelieveable as it sounds, Microsoft Songsmith is worth a download, even if you aren’t musical. While it may not be your end-all music creation solution, its a fun toy to turn your thoughts into song.

Video, information, and download here

Discussion thread here