What's the best way edit/cut a .m4a music file?

Question

What's the best way edit/cut a .m4a music file?

I have some old band tapes of me from 1979 that are on a CD. I have downloaded it to my Apple Music player on my MacMini. The only problem is that the recording I have is one long 50 minute file with 10 different songs contained. They are not divided into separate tracks which is what I want. I want to get them divided into separate tracks because I would love to upload them to a musical AI website online to clean up the sound and make them sound really nice.

So is there a free Apple App that I can download, and edit/cut this HUGE 50 minute .m4a file into 10 separate files? And if it's not free, maybe it's really cheap? Let me know. Thanks!

Mac mini

Posted on Jun 27, 2025 08:37 PM

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Answer 1

Jun 27, 2025 09:48 PM in response to CharlieBrown63

And this wonderful forum software just ate my reply.

Re-creating the reply:

General info: macOS app user guides: GarageBand for MacUser Guide - Apple Support

Getting from m4a to mp3: Convert an M4A file to MP3 on Mac - Apple Support

The easiest to describe is import the whole thing, chop it, export to your preferred track-related file name, quit. Then import the whole thing again, chop it, etc.

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Answer 2

Jun 27, 2025 09:17 PM in response to CharlieBrown63

CharlieBrown63 wrote:

From the App store?

And "free", as in, I don't have to pay them after 30 days?

Free.

GarageBand is in the App Store, if it’s not already installed on your Mac.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GarageBand

Audacity is available from the project website:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audacity_(audio_editor)

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Answer 3

Jun 27, 2025 11:03 PM in response to MrHoffman

I figured it out. Now if only I knew how to control all these knobs and sliders, LOL.

One of the songs I have, the beginning of it was a bit muffled because the friend of mine recording us, didn't have the recording level turned up on the cassette deck hooked up to my home stereo at the time. About halfway through the song, he turned the level up and all of a sudden the volume of the song goes up. I'd love to know how to correct THAT in Garageband.

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