Music Add To Library adds only 10 seconds of normal M4A files

Question

Level 1

14 points

Music Add To Library adds only 10 seconds of normal M4A files

Music insists on importing only 10 seconds of this file: Apple MPEG-4 audio - 6.8 MB. (It does this with several files from time to time). It is a seven minute song that plays just fine from the Finder and shows it as an M4A file - but gets chopped to ten seconds when imported into Music. Though in Finder it still shows as the complete original file as it had been. Same behavior after several attempts (each attempt proceeded by deleting the song from Music). Same behavior no matter if the import setting is MP3 encoder or AAC encoder. Converting the file(s) to MP3 results in the same behavior. MacOS is up to date.

Posted on Aug 13, 2023 02:56 PM

Reply

Answer 1

Sparks0829

Community Specialist

Aug 14, 2023 01:53 PM in response to Sunra956

Hi there Sunra956,

What is the original origin of this music file? Was it imported from a CD or downloaded from the Internet? Was it purchased from the iTunes Store? Learn more about the options available for importing here: Get started by adding music to Music on Mac - Apple Support

Also, have you tried importing while your Mac is booted in safe mode? That would be the next best step to further test the issue. Learn how to boot up in safe mode here: Use safe mode on your Mac - Apple Support

Let us know how it goes.

Thanks!

Reply

Answer 2

Sunra956 Author

Level 1

14 points

Aug 14, 2023 04:49 PM in response to Sparks0829

Hello Sparks 0829, The music files are ones I recently downloaded from the internet - along with 16 others from the exact same download. Only 4 of the 16 show up as 10 second files when 'Added to Library' in Music. The other 16 add fine. I tried in Safe Mode, and exactly the same thing happens. The same 4 of 16 show up as 10 second items, and the other 16 are just fine. These 4 play fine from the Finder, and appear in the Finder as complete and not truncated files, as do the other 16. Also it makes no difference if I convert them to MP3 (from M4A) - they still show up as 10 second files when Added To Library. This behavior appeared in the past about a year ago; and I never solved it then. Perhaps you'll have a new piece to the puzzle. By the way, this is on a less than one year old MacBook Air, M1, Ventura 13.5. Many Thanks for your thoughts about this.

Reply