Podcasting:Stingers and transitions between podcast segments
Audio has no chapter headings. When a podcast moves from one segment to the next, a short musical cue, a stinger, does the job of a heading. Listeners learn to hear it as "new section".
What makes a good stinger
- Short. Two to six seconds is plenty.
- Recognisable. Ideally built from your intro or main theme, so it belongs to your show.
- Clean start and end. A stinger should begin on a strong beat and end on a clear hit, not a fade.
Make them from your main tracks
You do not need separate stinger music. Take your show's main track and find a short, strong phrase: the first bar of a lift, or the final hit and its ring-out. Cut it on bar lines using the tempo from the track row. Cutting video to the beat has the maths.
- The Final Ticking on the Mystery & True Crime shelf
- The Final Ticking (Alt Mix) on the Mystery & True Crime shelf
The Final Ticking is ideal for crime show stingers: a short burst of its urgent pulse says "and then things changed". Its alt mix is even harder-hitting, good for the stinger before your biggest reveal.
Use them consistently
A stinger only works if it means the same thing every time. Decide what yours mark, whether new segments, ad breaks or a return from a break, and stick to it.
Mind the levels
Stingers play without speech underneath, so they can sit near the level of your voice. Make sure they are not louder, or listeners will be reaching for the volume.
See how stingers fit into a full episode in Scoring a true-crime episode.