You should listen to How Sound's episodes about music in story telling.

Is Audio Network worth it? Finding music is always tough

I'm wondering the same thing. All of my research has been... complicated. It can't be that hard, right?

My main thought is that if you are going to add music, keep the volume down low so the speech is not overwhelmed. You might also listen to other popular podcasts and listen to what they do.

I used epidemic sound. If you want to listen my podcast is pop-u-lore listed on all platforms

Have any musician friends? I asked a close producer friend if he had any “throwaways” he thought might work and he sent a bunch. We’re very close and he is always making music so that helps.

Test out AI tools like https://www.udio.com It will be 100% original yet close to a style you like.

I can make you something bespoke if you have a budget for it: https://louispalfrey.com/
Feel free to get in touch

Creating a music intro involves finding royalty-free music, recording a voiceover, and mixing them. I'm a podcast producer and editor, so if you need help with the audio editing, I'd be happy to assist.

Just cut what you need and add it where appropriate.

I play music live while recording with my Zoom r16 by using a xlr to 1/4'' adapter!

Do you mean adding it in while your recording and not while your editing?

pixabay and freemusiclibrary.com

I use Descript to edit my podcast and create intro/outro music

Have you considered finding a podcast editing company who specializes in creating custom intro / outro music/sync, and just work with them to create what’s needed?

Audacity and search YouTube.

https://pixabay.com/music/
This place has royalty-free music which you can use for your podcast for free.

Type in the genre keyword you want of the type of music you're looking for, and download it. You will need to edit it into your podcast using some sort of software. Look for an "easy-to-use editing software" and pick one you think you could learn. Then, just export out the audio as a .wav or .mp3 file.

DM me, I’m not Reddit familiar so I’m trying to get my feet wet with it. dM me I have great ideas and directions. For you.

Theres a pretty good Google doc that gives a general tutorial (+ links to required FREE extensions) on how to get your audio to sound nice post-recording but it leans towards a more bass-ier voice, so take it for what you will.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1fmS0Wp6EantjSmQiBnPWyCCOSNpiawjgCOdUJknKbnE/edit?usp=drivesdk

1. Get a mic that is not the Blue Yeti (I love the Rode Podmic USB)
2. Get it about three finger widths from you and point it at the corner of your mouth.
3. Have a windscreen/pop filter
   Check out Mike's Video https://youtu.be/WsmMMKRZp5g?si=dUsIEp7HjXEkvOOi

Moderator Required full disclosure: I am the head of Podcasting at Podpage and the founder of the School of Podcasting.

After I've done all the narration, I make sure to go through the following editing.

Noise Cancellation (Absolute MUST to have decent quality)

Equalization (look on youtube for walkthroughs of which settings give you a good EQ curve for voice)

Normalization

Compression

Then re-do the Normalization.

Quality comes out much better than the raw recording before edits.

compressor EQ and limiter

Define "professional". If you are talking about why your voice doesn't sound like you THOUGHT it should sound, no.

That is just what you sound like. We all went through it.

You need to install the lame encoder to export as an MP3 from Audacity or you can run it through iTunes and export it as an MP3.

I have just done this for the first time, I just exported it as an MP3 and then uploaded the podcast on the website.

Run it through Auphonic first. It will get your levels, compression, eq etc. You can even set it up to publish to podbean for you.

What specifically are you trying to do? It's better to focus on just one particular thing, instead of trying to "learn all of Audacity". As far as starting a podcast, just record the content now and worry about figuring out the editing stuff later.

I use audacity and I hate it. Don't be afraid to google each step.

"How do I connect a microphone to audacity"

"How do I see if audacity is recording?"

"Should I use stereo or mono tracks in audacity?"

Literally just google everything. Its a massive learning curve at first and it takes a long tedious time but once you get it you'll get faster.

Word of advice when you do finally master the basics. Record and edit sounds and etc in seperate projects -so background music in one, recording in another, interviews in another - and then export them separately when they're done, and mash them into a new final project. Audacity remembers each tiny edit you make per project. So if you clip and cut and paste on the same open window for hours, it will eventually slow down so much it will corrupt your file and you won't be able to even open it.

Audacity is free and good to get started but it's also absolutely garbage software. Good luck!

Hey! Don't know about audacity as I'm using reaper (which I suggest you to try it btw). Every DAW is different but at the same time concepts are the same. As an audio engineer myself I could say Post production can be a bit overwhelming though. I'd suggest learning basics first (leveling, pan, static mix, etc)

Check out this YouTube playlist, which covers all the basics of Audacity and more. You can skip a few videos which focus on music more than podcasting: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLZWGTnpapial7S0qIRzJCoGTpky_DBIzx

There's still a lot you can do with editing in Audacity (it has the best editor there is). Don't worry about the 'bells and whistles' like EQ and noise reduction; start with

'topping and tailing' - you often want to get rid of the beginning and the end of what you've recorded. Do this by

- clicking near the beginning, close to where you think you want your edited audio to start

- place the cursor - without clicking - to the left of where you've clicked. Then press the B button on your keyboard; this will play the audio up to where you've clicked earlier. Then place the cursor - without clicking - to the right of where you've clicked, and press the B button on your keyboard. This will play the audio from where you clicked earlier, and effectively previews the edit. If you're happy, go to the 'select' menu, select 'region', then 'track start to cursor', and use the scissors to make the edit. If you're not happy, click again in the audio where you think you might want your edited audio to start, and repeat. You do something similar at the end of the audio, except this time you use 'select' - 'region - 'cursor to track end'

Let me know when this works for you.

Just listen to the podcast and if it sounds bad, make it sound better. Others have mentioned best practices, and some of those things will work for you and some won’t. Try stuff and see what you like and what sounds good.

These are my steps for editing:

1. Clean up each track
   1. Noise Removal on Audacity (best NR I know)
   2. Run it thru Levelator, it's free and will help you a lot
2. Sync your tracks
3. Clean all tracks together
   1. Remove stutter, dead air, breathing, coughing, etc...
   2. Rearrange any time someone is talking over another person
   3. Remove anything that's not needed. Ex.: someone goes out of topic for a couple of minutes that don't add anything to the conversation
   4. Remove repeated lines. Sometimes people repeat themselves, keep the best version, remove the rest.
   5. Resync as needed. Sometimes tracks can desync after an hour or so of recording.
4. Separate talking topics in blocks
   1. Yes, even if your recording is not organized, organize it. Pull things left and right to make more sense to the audience
   2. Don't be afraid to remove anything that doesn't add to the cast
5. Add soundbites (optional)
6. Add background track (get freeuse songs)

Always start your podcasts with the same intro, then fade into the recorded audio tracks for the introduction. This creates a sound signature that your audience will quickly relate to and know who/what they are listening to.

Do use speech compression (loudness, not data rate - two totally different things with similar names).

Use it, but don't overdo it.

Why? Because you only have so many 'bits' of loudness before you get distortion, and the loudest sound (aka 'normalized') sets that maximum in your track. But most speech in your track won't be nearly that loud.

With speech compression, you grab those loud peaks and pull them down some. Now your track is all well below that digital ceiling, and you can pull everything up and make it (somewhat) louder. That's where not overdoing it comes in. A little is good. A lot is fatiguing to listen to.

The deets: While recording in Audacity, make most of your audio peaks hit about -15 dB. That leaves you room for someone to get excited and loud - hitting maybe -5 or so - without clipping. But that's a uselessly low audio track, so in 'post' (in editing) you have to bring it up. Set your 'threshold' at about -18, and your ratio about 4:1. Now any audio that rises above -18 is held down. If it starts 4 dB above your -18 threshold (so the peak hits -14), the result will be only a 1 dB increase. Finally raise the output (sometimes called 'makeup gain') so peaks reach around -3. Set a hard limiter at -0.5 dB and you catch those occasional transients that get really loud and keep them from clipping.

Curious to hear others' takes on this: I'd say upload as uncompressed mixed wavs if your platform auto converts to 128kbps mp3, because I've heard of people uploading at 128 only to have it re-converted to 128 by the platform - especially if they're adding any ads (not that that's an immediate prob for the OP, but I'm talking about best practice moving forward). You want only one stage of data compression. What's the current state of play with auto-conversion on the various platforms?

Goes without saying but make sure you get a separate audio track for every person.