About Stem Splitter
Agustina Checa proposed Stem Splitter as a way to teach close listening in music courses. The tool separates a recording into parts such as vocals, drums, and bass. Students can play the full recording or choose any combination of stems, slow down a passage, and attach notes to specific moments. They can follow a bass line through a change in the arrangement, for instance, then bring the drums back in to work out how the two parts shape the rhythm.
Checa designed the project for classes that take seriously the music students already know and make, as well as traditions they may be encountering for the first time. The parts a tool can separate reflect assumptions about how music is arranged. A label like other may group together several instruments that matter to the performance. Listening to those parts alongside the full recording gives students a way to examine those assumptions and develop their own account of how the music works.
It was prototyped and developed through the Critical AI Literacy Institute by CAIL's Zach Muhlbauer. These support docs are in beta and subject to change.
Listening Guy can suggest questions and operate the mixer. Listening Guy does not receive the recording or its waveforms, so listen to check its descriptions.
Getting Started
See Getting Started to join a course, sign in, and import a recording. See Splitter Basics for the Session Rack, status badges, and the app's navigation.
Listening and Sharing
Play the full recording or choose which stems to listen to together. You can slow down or repeat a passage. See The Mixer for those controls and Notes for attaching a comment to a point in the recording. You can also ask Listening Guy a question and check its answer by listening. See Export & Sharing to download or share a recording.
Teaching
Instructors can request course access to Stem Splitter through the CUNY AI Lab. See Classes to assign work and share folders, Student Onboarding to guide the first session, Live Sessions to lead playback, and Account Settings to set Listening Guy instructions. For listening tasks, see Teaching Tips, Sample Activities, and the demonstrated workflow in Use Cases.
Help
See Privacy & Limits for access, daily allowances, and file expiry, and Sandbox Docs for the Lab's companion tool. Contact AI Lab support about access, or choose Report a bug in the app footer for a technical problem.