Ok everyone I wrote this blog because there are still a large volume of dancers who do not know how to cut their own music and thus becoming frustrated with having to rely on someone else to do it for them, or not being able to use the music at all if there is a time limit.
I highly highly recommend a free open source program called Audacity. I have been using this for as long as I have been belly dancing because 1. It is free, 2. It is very intuitive and easy to use, 3. It has all the capabilities we need.
Below I am going to lay out the basic steps, some tips from personal experience and explain on how to utilize this program to cut your belly dance music so that you can create mixes, intro’s, compilations and so much more. Your creativity is the only thing that can hold you back.
Step 1. Go to http://audacity.sourceforge.net/
Step 2. On the home page click on the link in the yellow box that says “Downlad Audacity 2.0.2”
Step 3. Follow the prompts
Step 4. Open Audacity
Step5. Go back to the internet and now go download another useful program called Music Converter by https://shedworx.com/
**This program will convert your music to all the common audio formats one needs (will come in handy trust me)! **
Ok now here is where the fun begins…
Step 6. Get the song you want and put it on your desktop for ease of use and make sure it is in mp3 format (if not use your switch sound converter).
Step 7. Open Audactiy (if it wasn’t already) and under “FILE” choose OPEN and in the browse box select the song you put on your desktop.
Step8. The music will load onto your audacity and be visible. You can open several songs and they will stack below each other (this is how you make mixes eventually).
Step 9. Watch this tutorial on all the buttons
Step 10. Have fun! The concept is simple and can be compared to Microsoft word… a lot of cut, copying and pasting. Here is a short article with pictures to show you how to cut, copy and paste in Audactiy.
** I highly suggest you use the zoom tool to magnify the music to increments of 5 seconds. This will make it very easy to see EXACTLY where you have to select the music from.**
Hope this brings you relief in your music editing practice and if you are a newbie it is easy to learn so do not freak out. If anything you are more than welcome to call or email me with any questions. Thanks for reading this Orlando Belly Dancers blog once again and will post more Bellydance By Jennifer Inc. blogs soon.