Custom music for advertising is original music composed specifically for your campaign — built around your brief, your edit, and your brand. Nobody else gets it. It lives and breathes your creative.
At Swell Music + Sound, custom music composition is our core craft. We've written original scores for Nike, Postmates, Atlassian, the Golden State Warriors, Meta, and dozens more — from 6-second mnemonics to full campaign sonic identities. Custom library tracks start at $5,000. Scored originals with demos start at $10,000.
"The question isn't whether your brand sounds like something. It does — even if it's a random library track that a different brand licensed last week. The question is whether it sounds like you."
— Elad Marish, Founder \& ECD, Swell Music + Sound
Swell publishes its rate card. No mystery pricing, no fishing for budget. Here's what custom music costs:
| Package | What you get | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Custom library track | One original track built for your brief, from our 4,700+ track catalog as ideation base. Full stems, unlimited use. | $5,000 |
| Original score — 1 demo | One compositional direction, up to 5 rounds of revision, full stem delivery. | $10,000 |
| Original score — 5 demos | Five distinct compositional directions, up to 5 rounds of revision on selected direction, full stem delivery. | $15,000 |
| Original score — 8 demos | Eight compositional directions, up to 5 rounds of revision on selected direction, full stem delivery. | $18,000 |
All score packages include custom library pulls for the ideation phase. Hourly studio and engineering rate for work outside these packages: $375/hr. Contact us for voiceover, sonic branding systems, and multi-spot campaign pricing.
Custom music is not always the answer. Here's when it is:
Postmates came to Swell wanting a custom sonic palette — a family of original tracks they could drop into any spot or campaign, purpose-built so every piece of content sounded like Postmates. The result replaced the cycle of licensing generic library tracks for each campaign. One custom library, deployed across a full brand year.
Seven years of original music for Meta Reels. Approximately 500 tracks per year, approximately 100 independent artists engaged through Top Shelf Music. Tracks placed in Obama Foundation × Jordan Brand campaigns and Dunkin's Valentine's Day campaign. Over 109,000 creator uses across the catalog.
Four seasons of custom music including Sounds of the Holidays, built from approximately 100 captured arena sounds — shoe squeaks, hoop swishes, ticket scans — and Pre-Tip music for the jumbotron. View case study →
Custom music and voiceover production for one of the Bay Area's most recognizable tech brands. Long-running collaboration with the Atlassian marketing team.
Original music and sound design for Mark Rober's CrunchLabs YouTube channel, including custom scores for viral engineering content with tens of millions of views. View case study →
The most sophisticated brands don't choose one or the other — they choose both strategically. Custom music for brand-defining work: launch campaigns, hero spots, sonic branding systems. Library music for fill-in work: social content, evergreen explainers, low-stakes digital assets where the music is texture, not brand voice.
Swell provides both. Our sister platform Top Shelf Music offers 4,700+ pre-cleared, culture-first tracks for projects where library is the right call. We help you decide which is which — and execute both. See our music strategy guide.
"I've had a great experience working with Swell for voiceover and sound design. They're true pros who make the technical side easy to navigate and their friendly, approachable style makes the whole process enjoyable."
— Lena Brooks, Atlassian
"We love working with Swell! We're so happy to have found amazing audio post partners in the Bay."
— Douglas Stivers, Executive Producer, Cutwater Agency
Most projects start with a 30-minute call. Send us the cut, your brief, and your timeline. We'll scope the project honestly and tell you exactly what custom music will cost — and whether it's the right answer for what you're making.
