Figure Skating Aims to Get Its Groove Back—With AI Music and the Spice Girls

Figure Skating, once the second most popular televised sport in the U.S., is mounting a comeback by modernizing the music in skaters’ routines. It just needs to iron out the cost and rights issues first.

Art by Clark Miller

Of all the places AI is seeping into, a program by a pair of Czech ice dancers angling for a spot at the Winter Olympics in February may be one of the most unexpected.

Yet, at last weekend’s Skate America tournament, a major international competition ahead of Milano Cortina 2026, Kateřina Mrázková and Daniel Mrázek performed a program that included music partially composed by AI in the style of the rock band Bon Jovi. To any viewers baffled by the music selection, Gabriella Papadakis, the reigning Olympic ice dance champion and an NBC commentator, explained on the broadcast that the skaters’ music choice could be the start of a new normal in the sport.