Can anyone help with a music recording that I would like to improve?

[Biffatcrafts]

Hi, I'm hoping maybe the MN collective mind can help me. I'm a biff with technology and at a loss.

I have a voice recording .m4a format (recorded using Voice Recorder on a Samsung phone) which is of a now dead (and very much loved) relative playing my piano.

She is playing one of her own songs, but which she never wrote down. It is very special recording to me, and also for her husband who misses her terribly, and I know both he and I often play it when we think of her.

The problem is that the quality of the recording isn't great. It sort of sounds a bit muffled and if i turn the volume up it sounds a bit distorted. I was wondering if anyone knows of a kind of app (preferably free) that could clean up the recording to make it sound better? It probably doesn't help that my piano probably needed a bit of a tune up when she played it so some kind of auto tune ability would be great too.

I would be so grateful if anyone could help, or point me in the right direction, as it is the first anniversary of her death in a couple of months, and both her husband and I thought it would be wonderful to play this recording of her at the memorial service we are planning.

Many many thanks to anyone who reads this.

Bumping this for you.

Thanks :)

OP do you have a DC at school - their music or drama teacher might be able to suggest how to do it with their editing suite? They often have better tech than you can access easily. I can see why you treasure it so much

@TheSummerITurnedChubby Thanks for replying. I think your idea is a good one but unfortunately no, I don't have DC of school age.

Music production hobbyist here. Cutting out background noise, hum, hiss etc is easy to do but if it's muffled then sounds like a poor recording to begin with and that's difficult to change. You need audio editing software like Audacity and playing with the frequencies (cutting out the low end, boosting the high end) would probably make it sound less muffled.

What I would probably do in your position is go to a website like Fiverr, search up audio editing and find somebody experienced who can do it for a small fee.

@doroda Thank you 😊 I think you might be right that it's not great quality, but any improvement will be welcome. I will check out Fiverr now. Fingers crossed 🤞

@doroda Hi there, I just wanted to update you about my music question 😃I went on Fiverr and found a fabulous guy who has done wonders for the recording. Both I and my relatives are so happy with how it has turned out. Thank you so much for pointing me in that direction, we are all very grateful 🙏

@Biffatcrafts ah that's great, glad you found somebody.

@doroda wasn't too expensive either, certainly less than a good wreath, and this will last a lot longer and be something all our family can listen to and treasure ❤️