Extracting Segment(s) Of Songs

Question

Level 1

6 points

Extracting Segment(s) Of Songs

Greetings,

Is it possible to edit iTunes songs? That is to say, there is a very long Guitar Riff that I want to extract from a song downloaded from iTunes.

Thank you!

G5, Mac OS X (10.4.5), 6.5GB RAM, 1.3TB Storage

Posted on Jan 31, 2007 6:10 PM

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Answer 1

ed2345

Level 9

63,566 points

Jan 31, 2007 6:24 PM in response to lgldsr712

Right-click (or ctrl-click for Mac) on the song, then Get Info > Options and set a start time and stop time for the piece you want to keep.

That will affect playback only. If you actually want a new smaller file with only that section, use "Convert Selection to XXX." (This only works on unprotected files.)

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Answer 2

PT

Level 7

20,894 points

Jan 31, 2007 6:28 PM in response to lgldsr712

Sure it is possible, but how depends on what format the songs are in and which tools you are willing to use. A few that come to mind include Audacity (free), MP3 Trimmer (free to try but nagware (delay screens before certain functions if you are not registered), and Sound Studio are three that come immediately to mind.
Lately I have been using MP3 Trimmer a lot since my whole library is in MP3 format. MP3 Trimmer has the one great advantage of allowing you to trim MP3s without having to reencode them again, so no quality loss.
I trim the files then drag and drop the new versions back into iTunes then delete the old version out of iTunes. I use it a lot for those annoying "hidden tracks" on CDs where track #10 will be a 12 minute track with the first 3 minutes the actual song, then 7 minutes of annoying silence, then the "hidden track". I use MP3 trimmer to break it into two separate (and much less drive space than the original) tracks.
Patrick

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Answer 3

lgldsr712 Author

Level 1

6 points

Jan 31, 2007 7:00 PM in response to PT

Thanks Patrick. These are in .m4p and .m4a. Some were downloaded from iTunes, others imported from CD's.

Does this change your suggestions?

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Answer 4

lgldsr712 Author

Level 1

6 points

Jan 31, 2007 7:02 PM in response to ed2345

Thanks. It does say "Protected AAC Audio File", so I do not know what limitations that imposes...

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Answer 5

PT

Level 7

20,894 points

Jan 31, 2007 7:42 PM in response to lgldsr712

For protected songs, about the only option you have is to put them into a playlist and burn them out to an Audio CD. You can then reimport them from the CD as MP3 files to be edited with MP3 Trimmer or you can import them as AIFF (uncompressed) files and work on them with Audacity or Sound Studio and then convert the final segments to MP3 or AAC files in iTunes.
The unprotected ones you might be able to open directly with one of the audio editors, but I have no first hand experience with it so I am not sure. But in general, if QuickTime can open and play the songs, then they probably can as well.
Patrick

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