Editing the waveform

Select a range in the waveform

In the editor of an audio block (a recording or an imported file), the central area shows the sound wave. You can select a portion of it to copy, cut or replace.

• Click in the waveform and drag without releasing: the first point is the start of the range, the point where you release is the end. The selection updates as you go and stays highlighted.
• Ctrl + A selects the whole block.
• A right click on the waveform opens a menu: Select all, Copy, Cut, Paste. The same menu opens on a right click on the time ruler just above the waveform.

Mono or stereo

For a stereo block, a Mono / Stereo selector appears at the top right of the editor.

• Stereo: the selection and edits act on both channels together.
• Mono: they act on a single channel only, the one of the lane (top = left, bottom = right) where you start dragging. The two channels can then hold different sound at the same positions.

Free or beat-snapped

A second selector, Free / Beat, sits right after it (both are introduced by a Selection: label) and controls snapping:

• Free: the selection (and the time bar) land exactly where you click, to the sample.
• Beat: the selection endpoints and clicks on the time ruler snap to the nearest beat.

This choice is saved the moment you change the selector and kept from one editor session to the next, including after a restart of the software.

Thin vertical lines are drawn under the waveform on the beats, aligned with the ticks of the time ruler above (bar starts are a little stronger). They are always shown, whatever the Free / Beat mode. This grid, like the time ruler and the overview bar, follows the session's real tempo and time signature over the block's span: if the block contains an accelerando or a time-signature change, the bars tighten or widen accordingly, and the "Beat" snap snaps to the real beats.

Copy, cut, paste

• Copy (right-click menu or Ctrl + C) puts the selection on the clipboard, without changing the block.
• Cut (right-click menu or Ctrl + X) removes the selection from the block and keeps it on the clipboard.
• Paste (right-click menu or Ctrl + V) inserts the clipboard content at the time bar.
• Delete selection (right-click menu or the Delete key) acts like Cut, closing the gap in the block, but without touching the clipboard.

The clipboard is shared: you can copy in one block and paste in another, on another track, or even in another editor window. If the copied sound is mono and you paste into a stereo selection (or the other way round), it is converted automatically.

Move the time bar

Click the time ruler (just above the waveform) to place the time bar exactly where you click (or at the nearest beat in Beat mode). That point is the paste position, and where block playback resumes from.

The return to start button in the transport bar (left of the replay button) brings the time bar back to the start of the block; if the preview is playing, it resumes from there. The space bar starts or stops the block preview.

Transform the selection

Once a range is selected, the right-click menu also offers three transforms that are baked into the file (like a cut or paste, see "The _edited file"). Each modal has a Preview button that plays the selection with the pending effect, and a purple Confirm / Apply button.

While the preview plays, the Preview button turns into Stop: one click halts playback. If you change the volume, equalizer, effect or its fade curve while a preview is playing, it immediately restarts from the top with the new setting.

• Change the volume: a decibel field (with − / + buttons). The button stays greyed out while the value is 0 dB.
• Equalizer: three low / mid / high knobs (± 12 dB). Greyed out while the response is flat.
• Add an effect: the left list holds every available effect (reverb, compression, overdrive, fade-in / fade-out…); the right panel configures the selected one. There is no duration control: a fade spans the whole selection, and a tail effect (reverb, delay, echo) lengthens the block to fit its tail (the audio after is pushed later). A lengthening that would overlap the next block is refused.

The Mono / Stereo selector applies: in Mono mode the transform only touches the selected channel.

Crop to the selection

The Crop to the selection action in the right-click menu keeps only the selected part and discards the rest of the file. The block is shortened accordingly in the multitrack view. Cropping is always full-width (both channels) and is refused if the selection is shorter than 50 ms.

The right-click menu also offers Crop left and Crop right, which cut away everything before, or everything after, a cut point: the edge of the selection, or failing that the time bar, to the nearest sample. Both actions are also in the right-click menu of a block on the multitrack view (see the Midi blocks chapter).

Add silence

The Add silence action in the right-click menu inserts a range of pure silence at the time bar. No selection is needed: the audio after is simply pushed later, and the block is lengthened by the silence's duration in the multitrack view.

A window opens to choose that duration. The Unit selector offers two ways to enter it:

• Measures and beats: a Measures field and a Beats field, each with − / + buttons. Changing the measures recomputes the beats (measures × beats per measure). Changing the beats recomputes the measures only when the count is exact, otherwise the measures field is left empty. The Beats field sets the real silence duration, from the session tempo at the time bar's position.
• Milliseconds: a single field, in milliseconds.

The purple Confirm button inserts the silence; Cancel closes without changing anything. The action can be undone and redone (Ctrl + Z / Ctrl + Y), and is refused if the lengthening would overlap the next block on the track.

Shortening or lengthening a block

A cut shortens the block, a paste lengthens it. The block's length is updated in the multitrack view accordingly.

If a paste would make the block overlap the next block on the same track, the operation is cancelled and a message says so: move the next block first, or paste less content.

All of these edits can be undone and redone (Ctrl + Z / Ctrl + Y).

The "_edited" file

The first time you edit a block's waveform, the app duplicates its file and works on the copy, named with an _edited suffix (for example guitar_2.mp3 becomes guitar_2_edited.mp3). The original file stays untouched on disk, so you can always get it back. The suffix is kept if you rename the block.

Restore the original

For an edited block, a "Restore the original" button appears in the editor header, just to the right of the file name and the "open the file's location" icon. Clicking it opens a confirmation dialog: after you click Confirm, the _edited copy is deleted, the block goes back to its original file (its name loses the _edited suffix, in the multitrack and in the session) and returns to its original length. Every waveform edit made to the block is lost; the action can still be undone (Ctrl + Z).

Export the block

While the block editor is open, the menu bar's Export menu produces an audio file from the single block being edited (not the full session mix, see the Export your song chapter for that).

• Export as WAV / as MP3: same choice as the session export (lossless WAV, 192 kbps MP3).
• The block's own mix is applied: its volume, effects, equaliser and fade-in / fade-out. The track volume and the overall volume are not: the block is exported on its own.
• For a MIDI block, the notes are rendered to audio with the block's drum instruments or synthesiser sound.

The file is written to this block's own export folder (next to its own working file, never the whole session's shared export folder, see the Export your song chapter), under a number that is specific to this block: drums_v1.wav, drums_v2.wav… A previous export is never overwritten. Open the export folder opens that folder.

In a detached editor window, its reduced menu bar's Export menu does the same thing. For a file opened via File › Open an audio file, the export goes the same way to the export folder next to the working file.

Open in a new window

The "Open in a new window" button, at the top right of the editor, closes the editor (back to the multitrack) and reopens the same block in a separate window, named after its file. You can open several windows to compare or edit blocks side by side; everything stays in sync with the multitrack.

A detached window keeps a menu bar, but a reduced one: no "New session" / "Load session" / "Open an audio file" in the File menu, and no "Settings" or "My account" menus. The file name there is aligned to the left, with the "open the file's location" icon.

Open an audio file

The File › Open an audio file menu opens a two-section window to edit a .wav or .mp3 file that belongs to no session.

• Open a new file: pick a file from your disk with "Choose a file". It opens right away, with no confirmation step.
• Recent audio files: the list of files already opened this way, to reopen one with a click on "Open".

The chosen file is never edited where you found it: the application first makes a working copy of it (converted to the current format - see Settings › File format - if it doesn't already match) in its own folder, next to an export folder for its own exports. The real original file, wherever it lives on your disk, is never touched again: the "Restore the original" button restores this working copy, not the external file.

The editor window that opens next is identical to a block's, with its own undo / redo history. As with a block, the first edit creates an _edited copy next to the working file.