A mixed-down audio file of one group of elements, like all the drums.
A stem is an audio file containing a mixed-down group of related elements from a song — for example, all the drums together, all the vocals, or all the instruments — bounced as a single track. Stems sit between the full mix and the individual raw tracks, and they are extremely useful: they let a mastering engineer make adjustments to broad groups, allow remixers and DJs to rework a song, and make live performance and collaboration easier. Sharing stems is a common way for producers to hand a project to someone else while keeping the major sections separate and controllable, without exposing every single track or revealing the original session files.
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