Updates 2026
With the rise of AI in audio, tools have improved and can actually remove some of the cleanup burden without having to deal with full-fledged audio software.
Some tools that we’ve tested and can recommend:
Cleanvoice AI — Free trial + paid
Cleanvoice AI is a strong option if you want more than simple noise removal. It can help remove background noise, filler words, long silences, mouth sounds, and other distracting parts of a voice recording.
This can be helpful if your meditation recording has minor imperfections, such as awkward pauses, breaths, or mouth clicks, that would take too long to clean up manually.
Trebble — Free + paid
Trebble is a browser-based audio editor designed like a word processor, letting you edit based on the text. It’s easier than traditional audio software. Includes tools for voice enhancement, noise reduction, silence cleanup, and simple editing.
Adobe Podcast Enhance Speech — Free + paid
Adobe Podcast Enhance Speech is one of the simplest tools to try. Upload your spoken audio, let it process the file, and compare the result.
It can make a rough voice recording sound much clearer, especially if there is room echo or background noise. The only thing to watch out for is that it can sometimes sound too processed, so always listen carefully before using the final result.
Lesson Summary
Now it’s time to shape the raw recording into a finished meditation. You’ll learn how to clean up the voice, even out the volume, remove unwanted sections, create natural pauses, move phrases around, and use fades so your edits sound smooth rather than obvious.
Transcript
Module 6: Editing Your Track.
We’re back in REAPER. Let’s open the vocal recording from the last module. Go to File, Open Project, and locate the REAPER project file in the Meditation Sample Project folder. Open it to return to the original project, which currently contains only the vocal track.
Now we’re going to import the other audio files. In the previous module, I demonstrated ways to create music and soundscapes. In the meantime, I’ve recorded three tracks for this edit: Forest Ambience and Tibetan Bowl, both created in NatureSoundsFor.Me, and Soft Electric Piano from Ambient Mixer.
Open the project folder, select those three WAV files, and drag them into REAPER’s track pane. When REAPER asks, choose to import them on separate tracks. We now have four tracks to edit: the vocal, piano, Tibetan bowl, and forest ambience.
Save the project so the project file contains both the original vocal and the additional music files. I’ll also disarm the vocal track and name it “Vocals” by double-clicking the track-name area and entering the text.
Let’s hear the raw version. Nothing has been mixed or processed yet; we’ve simply loaded the WAV files we recorded:
“As you breathe slowly and deeply, imagine a vibrant yellow light flow into your body with every breath you take.”
Everything already sounds good, but we want to edit the vocal parts and loop some of the music and soundscapes. Zoom out horizontally so you can see the longest waveform and the full duration. In this project, the music ends at about four minutes and 48 seconds.
The individual audio tracks are called stems. These are the parts we mix together, equalize, add effects to, and pan left or right in the stereo field. Together, they create the stereo master file that becomes the finished track on a CD or digital release. The stems are also represented in the mixer window at the bottom, where you can change their volume and pan position.
Two useful track controls are M and S. M means Mute, and S means Solo. Solo isolates one track and mutes all the others, which lets you hear that stem by itself. Removing Solo returns all the tracks to the mix. If you want to remove one track temporarily, use Mute.
For this demonstration, I want to extend the vocal so it lasts longer—perhaps another minute—by separating some sections and placing more space between them. I also want to split the electric-piano track before a bass-guitar part enters, then loop only the soft-piano section. The Tibetan bowl and forest ambience currently end at about one minute, so those will be looped and crossfaded into continuous background soundscapes.
I’ll start the voice a little later in the mix, perhaps 30 to 40 seconds in, and add pauses throughout. In the sections where the script asks listeners to repeat a phrase internally, I’ll insert enough space for them to do so. The result will be a gentle five-minute meditation.
First, let’s work with the vocal track. At its beginning, you can hear a high-pitched layer of steady background noise. We’ll capture a short section of that noise and use it as a noise profile. The space bar starts and stops playback, so you can use it to make a precise selection.
Drag across a short section of silence before the voice begins. REAPER’s horseshoe-shaped magnet icon controls Snap. With Snap turned on, selections and items lock to the timeline grid; with it off, you can position them freely. For the noise sample, select a short region containing only the background noise.
Select the track’s FX button and add the ReaFIR VST plug-in. The check mark beside an effect shows that it is active. In ReaFIR, set Mode to Subtract and enable “Automatically build noise profile.” Briefly play approximately a quarter to half a second of the selected noise. The graph displays the profile it captured.
Now disable automatic profile building but leave the effect itself enabled. ReaFIR will subtract that noise profile from the rest of the track, leaving a cleaner background behind the voice. Close the effect window and compare playback with the plug-in enabled and bypassed. With ReaFIR active, the extra high-frequency noise is noticeably reduced.
Get into the habit of saving after every step. Select Save Project or press Control-S every few minutes. If the computer shuts down or the project encounters a problem, you’ll then lose only the last few minutes of work.
Next, we’ll make the vocal level more even. Open the FX window again, choose Add, and select ReaComp. This is a compressor: it reduces louder parts of the vocal and brings up quieter parts so the level is more consistent. Choose a preset such as “Modern Vocal” and play the track while adjusting the balance between the processed and original signals. Wet is the affected signal; Dry is the original.
Using the preset raises the vocal naturally. Quieter phrases come forward, louder phrases are controlled, and the overall volume becomes more even. Leave both ReaFIR and ReaComp enabled and listen to the voice with the other tracks. It now sits farther forward in the mix without becoming excessively loud; it has presence and body. This is still editing rather than final mixing, but it prepares the voice for the mixing and mastering module.
Save again, remove the old noise-profile time selection, and zoom out horizontally. Because we’re aiming for a five-minute meditation, move the vocal item so it begins at about 40 seconds. The ambience and Tibetan-bowl tracks will temporarily finish before the voice, but we’ll loop those later. For now, keep the vocal soloed and concentrate on its pacing.
Follow the script while editing. After the instruction, “Try to keep that smile on your face while you repeat quietly in your mind after me,” the recording contains affirmations such as:
“I love my life.”
“I am grateful for my life.”
“I love who I am.”
“I am confident.”
We want to leave roughly four or five seconds after each phrase so the listener can repeat it internally. Zoom into the waveform and play the first transition. The original recording leaves less than two seconds, so we’ll extend the pause.
Place the cursor after the first phrase and press S to split the item. Move to the start of the next waveform and split again. Select the unwanted material between those cuts, delete it if necessary, and drag the next phrase farther along the timeline. Hover at the top corner of the item and create a short fade so the edit enters naturally.
Play the result to check the spacing between “I love my life” and “I am grateful for my life.” Repeat the same technique for the remaining affirmations: split at the end of one phrase and before the next, remove unwanted audio, reposition the next item, and add a short fade. In this example, pauses of roughly three to four seconds sound more natural than longer gaps.
After the edits, zoom out to see all the segments cut from the original item. The principle resembles editing on tape in earlier decades, when engineers physically cut and joined recorded tape. Play the edited section while following the script to confirm that each affirmation is followed by a comfortable pause.
The script calls for the entire affirmation section to be repeated. Before duplicating it, select the separate edited pieces and glue them back together so they behave as one item. This keeps the repeated section easy to move and align while preserving the pacing and fades you’ve created.