Other groups went different ways. The late 1940s explosion in square dancing happened in part because of technological progress: it was now practical to record a band once and play it back millions of times to support dancing all over the country. Callers would buy a sound system, including a record player, and all they needed was some dancers and a hall. This let modern square dancing grow enormously.

Contra dance took a different path, coming through the 70s folk revival with a strong commitment to live music. Musicians were drawn to the dance form, and dancers learned to play. With regular opportunities to perform, they learned to adapt playing to support the dancing. As the choreography and musical sensibilities changed over the years, the live tradition could change with it. I love what bands are doing now, and if you compare hall recordings to decades ago it's impressive how much the genre has matured and flourished.

It's not just contra dance: there are communities of people who hand-craft assembly to make demos, even though the software industry has long-since automated this with compilers. My cousin makes bagpipes out of wood, even though you'd have trouble hearing the difference between these and something injection-molded from plastic. My dad has serving bowls we made out of clay, even though they're heavier and less round than what a machine could press. People still watch humans play Go, even though computers are better now. People watch humans race, even though machines are faster, and they also watch machines race. This can be a categorical decision to always go with human effort, or a case where both forms exist side by side but with prestige or sentiment pushing towards the human.

I like this as a model for what art and achievement could look like in a post-AI world, assuming we make it through to the other side. Some communities can embrace technology and explore what's possible with full AI assistance. Other communities can make an intentional decision to keep doing things the traditional way, accepting that this will be less perfect and less efficient. Yet others can mix them, appreciating what humans have been able to make for what it is, while also getting the practical benefits of automation. I'm not worried that the music I love will disappear, because economically it's been obsolete for decades. It's still here because we want it to be.