If you are about to send your songs to a mixing and mastering engineer, how you export your stems matters more than almost anything else you'll do. Clean stems mean a faster turnaround, a better-sounding result, and fewer revision rounds. Messy stems mean wasted time on both ends.

Here is the process I recommend to every artist working with Terra Echo Studios.

What is a stem, exactly?

A stem is a single track of your song exported on its own — the lead vocal, the kick drum, the bass, a guitar, and so on. Instead of sending one stereo mixdown, you send each element separately so the mixing engineer can shape them independently.

Export every stem from the same start point

This is the single most important rule. Every stem must start at the exact same timestamp — the very beginning of the session (bar 1, beat 1), even if that track doesn't come in until the second chorus.

When all stems start from the same point, they line up perfectly when imported. If you trim each file to where the audio begins, nothing will line up and your engineer has to manually re-sync dozens of files. Most DAWs have an "export from session start" or "consolidate from zero" option — use it.

Use the right format and settings

Format: WAV or AIFF. Never MP3 — it's lossy and throws away detail you can't get back.
Bit depth & sample rate: Export at the session's native rate (commonly 24-bit / 44.1kHz or 48kHz). Don't upsample or convert.
No master-bus processing: Turn off any compressor, limiter, or EQ on your master/stereo bus before exporting. That processing should happen during mixing and mastering, not be baked in.
Keep individual track plugins that are part of the sound (a specific guitar tone, a vocal effect you love) — just bypass anything on the master bus.

Name your files clearly

Name each stem for what it is: Lead Vocal, Kick, Bass DI, Gtr L, Synth Pad. Avoid Audio 1, Audio 17, Track 22. Good names save real time and prevent mistakes.

Check your levels

Make sure no stem is clipping (peaking into the red). Leave some headroom — peaks around -6dB are a safe target. A quiet, clean stem is always better than a loud, distorted one.

Include a reference

Send a rough mix of the full song and one or two reference tracks — commercially released songs whose sound you're chasing. This tells your engineer where you want to land far better than words can.

A quick pre-send checklist

All stems exported from the same start point
WAV/AIFF, native bit depth and sample rate
Master-bus processing removed
Files clearly named
Nothing clipping, with headroom left
Rough mix + reference tracks included

Not sure how to export?

That's completely normal — every DAW does it a little differently. If you're unsure, just get in touch and I'll walk you through it for your specific setup. It's a five-minute conversation that saves everyone hours.

Ready to send your project? Start your mix here →