🤖Claude Desktop Setup Guide

Connect SonicAura MCP to Claude Desktop

Follow the steps below to add SonicAura's audio tools to Claude Desktop. Once connected, Claude can split stems, remove vocals, and denoise audio directly from chat — no extra app needed.

⏱ ~2 min setup🔐 OAuth 2.1✅ Free tier supported

Before you start

• Claude Desktop 0.7.0 or newer
• A SonicAura account (sign up at sonicaurastudio.com)
• At least 1 credit on your account (free tier includes 2 credits)

Step-by-step setup

Install Claude Desktop

Download and install the latest version of Claude Desktop from claude.ai/download. Make sure it is version 0.7.0 or newer.

Open the config file

Claude Desktop reads MCP servers from a JSON config file. Open the file below in your editor. If it does not exist, create it.

macOS

~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json

Windows

%APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json

Paste the SonicAura config

Copy the JSON below into the file. If the file already has an "mcpServers" key, merge the "sonicaura" entry into it instead of replacing the whole file.

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "sonicaura": {
      "url": "https://api.sonicaurastudio.com/mcp",
      "headers": {
        "Authorization": "Bearer YOUR_API_KEY"
      }
    }
  }
}

Replace YOUR_API_KEY with the key from your MCP dashboard.

Restart Claude Desktop

Fully quit Claude Desktop (not just close the window — use Cmd+Q on Mac or right-click the tray icon on Windows), then reopen it.

Authorize & verify

When you first ask Claude to use a SonicAura tool, it will open your browser for OAuth authorization. Sign in with your SonicAura account, click Authorize, and return to Claude.

Verify the connection

In Claude Desktop, start a new chat and type:

Check SonicAura service status for me.

Claude should call check_service_status and reply with your available credits and service status. If it does, you are all set.

Available tools

check_service_status

Check if the service is ready and how many credits you have.

get_my_credits

Query your remaining separation credits.

get_upload_url

Get a presigned URL to upload large audio files.

upload_audio

Upload small audio files (<1MB) via base64.

submit_separation

Submit a stem separation task (2/4/6 tracks).

check_separation_status

Check task progress and download the separated stems.

Troubleshooting

The tools do not appear after restarting Claude Desktop.

Check that your JSON is valid (use a JSON linter), that the API key is correct, and that you fully quit the app (not just closed the window) before reopening it.

The browser authorization window did not open.

Make sure your default browser is not blocking pop-ups. You can also try clicking the tool again — Claude will re-trigger the OAuth flow if the token is missing or expired.

Where can I find the MCP logs?

On macOS: ~/Library/Logs/Claude/mcp.log. On Windows: %APPDATA%\Claude\logs\mcp.log. These logs show the exact error if a tool call fails.

I see "Authentication required to use this tool".

This is the OAuth step. Click the "Connect" button in the tool call card, complete the browser sign-in, and the tool will run automatically afterwards.

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