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Podcasts-Recording and Producing: Adding Music

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In this section of the research guide we will discuss how and why to use music for your podcast, including where to find it, issues with copyright, and how to edit it into your podcast. 

Finding Music

When creating your podcast you might find the need for music. It could be used as an intro or an outro or as a transition. Due to copyright issues finding music for your podcast isn’t as simple as finding a song in your library and dropping it in. Luckily, there are places to find music that you can use for your podcast where you do not have to worry about copyright issues.

 

Here are some great places to look:

You might also be interested in using sound effects for your podcast. (This will depend on the type of podcast.)

You can find them here:

If still are looking for more resources or want to know more about copyright you can check out the libraries research guide on Copyright for Digital Assignments:

  https://researchguides.library.wisc.edu/copyrightfordigitalmedia

One of the important things to remember when adding music to your podcast is that it needs to be appropriate for your podcast. Most royalty free music, or production music, will lack vocals so as to not distract from anything else. Also, consider the mood and tone of your podcast. Sometimes it is okay to have a little music underneath people speaking, especially leading into or coming back from a transition.

Mixing

In most situations when you are working on your podcast you do not want your music to start and stop abruptly, but instead to gently fade in and out, and not draw attention to itself or away from the main content.

 

To do this we will need to use the Automation button on the track tab. This is the button furthest to the right on the settings of the track. It looks like a group of points on graph.

 

 

  1. Click on the automation button
  2. Click on the ‘automation’ box that appears
  3. From the menu select ‘Volume’. A purple line should appear beneath the audio in the track. If you click on the line little dots will appear like this:

 

 

The volume will always move towards the next dot, either up or down. For example:

 

 

Here we see the volume decrease until it reaches the dot. You can also click on the point where change starts and drag it forward or back:

 

 

A steeper line means a more sudden change, both in volume and in rate.