I have the most bizarre issue. Background: I have been using Audacity for years to edit music for a dance studio. I import purchased songs, and do custom mixes, edits or cuts. I have never ever had an issue with Audacity. I’ve had complex files with 8 songs blended together, with many cuts, cross-fades, etc. It has always worked excellent! I love Audacity!
I am using Audacity 2.0.5. I have Windows8 64bit os.
This particular project is straight forward. I imported song 1, then song 2. I keep all of song 1 followed by song 2 (cut shorter) to make one long song. I listen and it is exactly how I need it to be. I export as normal. I assign a custom file name and custom metadata (all blank except own title and own album name.) Then when I listen to exported song in any other media player, it plays song 1 perfect but song 2 is magically a totally different song!
I’ve tried various ideas to solve this: deleting/moving the original files from my media library; renaming various files, and saving exported file to a different folder. I created a new audacity file, re-doing my work. First I imported only song 2 (the one exporting incorrectly) and then I exported only song 2. It worked fine in 2 formats: WAV and MP3! Then I imported song 1 (no issues with) and exported combined songs in the 2 formats- in both cases, song 2 is a totally new song! After that error, from that same audacity file I exported just the selected section of the song 2, and it exported fine. I don’t understand how song 1 can change song 2!
Any ideas why this is happening or how to get around it? I really need to have the combo song. It is for a performance that is coming up. We don’t have much time.
Weird indeed.
Of course, what appears to be happening is impossible, so, like a magic trick, something is probably misleading you to think something is happening when it actually something else is happening. (If we can figure this out we have the makings of a terrific illusion )
Let’s call the exported “mix” track, “Song 3” and the “unknown phantom song” “song x”.
Try closing Audacity, then re-open Audacity.
Open your file browser and find song 3.
Drag song 3 into Audacity and press Play.
What do you hear?
If “song 3” is still a mix of song 1 and “song x”:
Create a new folder.
Open or make a new copy of the “mix” and export it into the new folder. (Check that it plays correctly).
Close and re-open Audacity.
Open the new folder in your file browser.
Drag the new “song 3” into Audacity and press Play.
What do you hear?
Thank you so much for such a helpful reply. I was about to try a few things including your suggestion when I discovered the problem. I was asked by the teacher who needed the music edits to use all of song 1, and a min and a half of song 2. So I didn’t question it. As I was investigating, I realized that song 1 actually had a pause mid-song (with a distinct end) and went into the “mystery song X”. I think the teacher using the CD didn’t realize that was part of the same song. I am relieved to know it was human error and not a glitch!
Again, thank you so much! If you’d like to delete this thread as it doesn’t pertain to Audacity, that is okay with me! Now that I know this resource is here, I plan on investing a lot more time learning Audacity to utilize more features! thank you, thank you, thank you!
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