Make music

1The Music Track asset

A Music Track is its own kind of asset: "A music track that plays in the browser, with artwork, lyrics, and chapters. Set artist, album, and track number for your catalog." It is where a song, a beat, a score cue, or a whole album of tracks is published as first-class work you can sell.

It is the third audio sibling next to podcasts and audiobooks, sharing their studio and player, but tuned for listening: bigger artwork, a repeat toggle, and no speed control. A track stays on FoundryInk. It does not go out to podcast apps. So the choice is simple. Want episodes in podcast directories? Make a podcast. Want a track that plays and sells here? Make a Music Track.

2Create it, then bring the audio

You make a Music Track through the create wizard, the same way you make any asset. It starts empty. There is no file to attach yet, and the wizard tells you as much: Your music track is created. Upload the audio, set the artist, album, and track number, then publish from the editor.

The editor has three tabs: Setup for the file and track details, Studio for the multitrack mixer, and Publish. In Setup, upload one audio file (MP3, M4A, AAC, WAV, or OGG). Now pick your path. If you already have a finished mixdown, drop it in and go, no Studio needed. If you want to build or polish the track from separate parts, head to the Studio tab, covered next. Both paths land on a publishable track.

3The Audio studio

Open the Studio tab and you land in the Audio studio, a multitrack editor. Start with the Track button (Add a track) for each part you want to layer. Bring sound in from the Media panel: hit Import audio (its empty state reads "No audio yet. Import voice, a music bed, or sound effects to build your mix."), then drop a source onto the timeline at the playhead. Prefer to sing or speak live? Use Record from the microphone. Audition with the transport: Play / pause (space bar), To start, and Stop, watching the time readout. A mix grows by stacking tracks, a vocal over a beat over a pad, and sliding each clip along one shared timeline. Reach for Zoom in, Zoom out and Snap to grid to place things cleanly.

4Arrange and balance

With clips on the timeline, you shape them. Select a clip and the Inspector gives you its Level (its volume in dB), Fade in and Fade out, plus Split and Delete. Drag a clip to move it, or drag across it to select a range. Every track carries its own mute, solo, volume and pan, and the master adds a Mix level and Duck music under voice, which dips the music whenever a voice plays.

Balance is most of a mix. Solo a track to hear it alone, set levels so nothing fights, pan parts left and right to open the stereo picture, and fade clip edges so nothing clicks.

5Clip effects

Select a clip and the Effects menu wakes up. Until you do, it just reads Select a clip to apply effects. Reach for Normalize (peak to -1 dB) to bring a quiet clip up to a consistent peak so it sits level with the rest. Nudge a hair louder or softer with Amplify +3 dB or Amplify -3 dB. Shape the edges with Fade in and Fade out. Highlight a range first, then Silence selection kills a stray breath or bump, Trim to selection keeps only the part you want, and Split at selection cuts the clip in two. Everything here is non-destructive: each effect is remembered as an edit, never burned in, so you can keep tweaking and re-render later.

6EQ, compression, and the limiter

Every track carries an EQ & Compressor panel, and it is free to use. Start with EQ to carve space. The 3-band gives you a low shelf at 200 Hz (Low), a sweepable parametric mid (Mid with Mid freq), and a high shelf at 3 kHz (High). Roll off a little low mud, sweep the mid to find harshness, and lift the High for air. Next, flip on Enable compressor to even out an uneven performance using Thresh, Ratio, Attack, Release and Makeup. Finally, on the master, Enable master limiter and set a modest Ceiling and Release so loud moments never clip. A couple of dB does more than heavy processing.

7Render the mix

You build and balance in the studio, but the arrangement itself is not what listeners hear. When the mix sounds right, press Render & set as audio. That bounces your whole multitrack arrangement down to one file and sets it as the track's audio: "This mix is rendered and set as the episode's audio. Edit and re-render any time."

Your editing is autosaved as you go (watch the small Saving then Saved indicator), so the arrangement is never at risk. Rendering is a separate, deliberate step that commits the finished sound. Come back whenever you like, nudge a level, trim a clip, then render again to update the version people play (and what a download delivers). Build, balance, render to lock it in.

8Details for your catalog

Good metadata is how your track gets found and credited, so treat this like a record sleeve. In Setup, the Track details section holds Artist, Album and Track #. Fill in at least artist, album and genre. Open the collapsible Audio metadata section for distribution fields that get embedded in the published audio and surfaced in search, player UI, and syndication feeds: Genre, BPM, Key, ISRC, an Explicit content flag, Composer and Copyright. If you have an ISRC, add it so plays credit correctly. Then Upload cover art, drop in lyrics as a .vtt file, and mark Sections to label your chapters: intro, verse, chorus, bridge, outro.

9Preview, price, publish

Give listeners a taste before the paywall. Use Set preview clip to pick a free-preview length, thirty seconds by default, so a non-buyer hears a snippet, then meets a prompt to buy or subscribe for the rest. Choose a section that sells the track: a hook, a chorus, the moment the arrangement opens up, not a slow four-bar intro that fades before anything happens. When it sounds right, go to the Publish tab.

There are two layers. Streaming is the default: the track plays online for anyone with access. A download is an extra you switch on if you want to sell the actual audio file, and you turn that on in this asset's pricing. Without it, people listen but keep nothing.

10What a listener gets

When you publish, your track lands in a clean, single-track browser player built for music. The large cover artwork sits up top with your artist and album right below, then play and a Repeat toggle to loop it. This is tuned for listening, so there is no podcast-style speed control or skip. Any Sections you set appear as a list a listener can jump around, and Lyrics show if you added them, so the words and structure are right there. On a paid track, a non-buyer sees dimmed artwork and "Purchase or subscribe to listen to this track.", and once the free preview ends, "That's the free preview." with a prompt to buy or subscribe.

11Working together, and what this is not

The Audio studio can go live for a team. With an Enterprise live-collaboration seat (the same paid seat that lights up the board and the drawing canvas), several people can work the same mix at once, with presence and a live status, and everything stays in sync. Without a seat it is a normal single-editor studio.

Be clear about the shape of this tool. It is a multitrack editor for arranging and mixing audio you bring in, not a music-production suite. There is no metronome or tempo engine, no MIDI or piano roll, no software instruments or synths, and no built-in loop or sample library. You make your parts elsewhere (or record them), then arrange, treat and mix them here.

12Put a track out

The whole path, start to finish. Create a Music Track, then choose your route. Already have a finished song? Upload the file, add artwork and details, and publish. That is the fast lane, no studio required. Want to assemble or polish from parts? Open the Audio studio, arrange your clips, balance levels, and add EQ, compression and a master limiter, then hit Render & set as audio. Either way, fill in the Track details and metadata, add cover art, lyrics and sections, and set a preview clip so browsers get a taste before the full play. Publish when it feels right. Want to sell the file? Turn on a download in pricing. Now you have a real, catalogued piece of music that streams in the browser, sitting alongside the rest of your work, ready for people to press play.

Questions musicians actually ask