Polyphonic WAV Files

A polyphonic wav file is one wav file that contains three or more audio channels, like the example below.

Retain the original accession files. Navigate to the Accession folder for the interview and create an "edit" folder in the Accession folder. This is where you will save all the following edits to the original files.

First, confirm if the top two channels are the same, or the stereo mixed down from the recording device. If the remaining channels are the individual mic channels or 'dead' channels, then they can be ignored. Right click on the imported file name in the Files panel in Audition. From the menu, select "Extract Channels to Mono Files". Each audio channel will then have a suspended mono wav file created in the Waveform editor. Select channels 3+, right click, and select "Close Selected Files". When the pop-up window asks if you would like to save changes, select "No To All". You should now have the original wav file and the two suspended mono wav files for channels 1 and 2. Navigate to the Multitrack editor and create a new session. Title the session appropriately for the original wav file so that you can maintain the file names for later, especially if stitching multiple files for a single interview. Set the file location as appropriate. It should be fine to maintain the 48kHz sample rate and bit-depth of 32-bit float--be sure the mix is set to stereo. In the new Mulitrack session editor, drag the suspended mono channel 1 wav to Track 1 and then drag the suspended mono channel 2 wav to Track 2. For Track 1, set the pan to L100 and for Track 2, set the pan to R100 [see photo below].

From here, go to the top menu for the Audition program and select Multitrack > Mixdown Session to new File > Entire Session. A new wav file will be created that combines the two tracks you just panned left and right. Save this wav file, this is now the file to use for the interview going forward. Do this by selecting the wav mixdown file in the Files panel, select save (cmd+s) and a Save As window will pop up. Enter the correct file name and location to save file. The format should already be set to Wave PCM. Sample rate of 48kHz and 32-bit depth is fine. You may now close this Audition session, you do not need to save the other files or sessions for the project--you only need the mixdown wav file that you saved. When you are then ready to create a draft of the interview, use the mixdown wav file with the two channels.