Prompt Lyria for music

Last updated: October 12, 2026

Lyria, from Google DeepMind, writes a full piece of music from one prompt: a 30-second cue, a menu theme, or a song with vocals. Pick it when you can say what the track is for and how it should move, and want the arrangement to follow your plan.

Let the agent write it

You don't have to write any of this yourself. The Layer agent knows how to prompt each model it runs, from the same guidance this page is built on. Name the model and the cue, for example: Score our main menu with Lyria 3 Pro: a warm orchestral fantasy theme, 30 seconds, quiet harp intro, horn melody, no vocals. The agent writes the prompt, shows you its plan, and runs it when you approve. Use the rest of this guide when you want to write or adjust the prompt yourself, and see Write a brief for the agent for how to brief it.

When to use it

Use Lyria for game music with a shape: menu and title themes, level and exploration beds, stingers for a win or a game over, trailer cues, and songs with lyrics in eight languages. It follows named instruments, a tempo, a key and a timeline of sections.

It is not a sound-effects model, and it has no loop control: for a loop, cut one from a steady track in an audio editor. For other music models, see Create music.

Versions on Layer

Lyria 3 Pro

The version this guide's clip was made with. Tracks run up to about three minutes, and it follows a length and a timeline you write in the prompt. Use it for cues of a set length.

Lyria 3.5

Google's latest, for full-length songs and themes with vocals, lyrics and several sections. Its tracks run from about a minute to a few minutes; it does not go shorter.

Lyria 3

Always returns a clip of about 30 seconds. Use it to try ideas quickly, and keep lyrics short.

How to write the prompt

Genre and job, mood, instruments, tempo and key, the timeline, then vocals or "no vocals":

Orchestral fantasy main-menu theme for a cosy adventure game, 30 seconds long. Mood: warm, hopeful, wondering. Concert harp, solo French horn, warm string section, soft celesta, light timpani. 84 BPM, D major. [0:00-0:08] Intro: harp arpeggios alone, quiet. [0:08-0:24] Main theme: the horn carries the melody over full strings and gentle timpani. [0:24-0:30] Outro: strings resolve on a held D major chord and fade out. Instrumental only, no vocals.

Say what the track is for, because a menu theme, a combat layer and a credits song are written differently in the same style. Then name everything you care about: whatever you leave out, the model picks for the genre. That prompt is the one in the clip above.

What works

Length and timeline on Lyria 3 Pro

There is no duration control for Lyria, so the length goes in the prompt: say it ("30 seconds long") and write a timeline that ends there. On Lyria 3 Pro, the prompt above came back 29.7 seconds long, quiet for the harp intro and louder from about eight seconds in, then fading at the end, as the timeline asks. The same music with no length or timeline ran about two and a half minutes. We measured length and level, which can't tell you how it sounds, and it was one take each.

Timestamps as a plan on Lyria 3.5

Lyria 3.5 treats the timeline as proportions. A 30-second ask came back about a minute long twice, and the eight-second intro stretched to about fourteen seconds with it. Use timestamps on 3.5 to set the order and balance of sections, and for a cue under a minute, use Lyria 3 Pro or Lyria 3.

Named instruments, mood, tempo and key

"Concert harp, solo French horn" steers the sound where "orchestra" leaves it to the model. Give the mood in a word or two ("warm, hopeful"), a BPM and a key, and an era where it matters ("'90s hip-hop", "2000s pop"). You can blend styles: "a K-pop tune with a Motown edge".

Vocals and lyrics

Describe the voice: male or female, range (baritone, soprano), texture (gravelly, breathy, soulful), and how it changes ("starts confident, gets quieter as the track goes on"). For your own words, write Lyrics: and keep them apart from the musical direction, with section tags on their own lines: [Verse], [Chorus], [Bridge]. Put backing vocals in parentheses: "Let's go (go)". Write the prompt in the language you want sung.

An image to set the mood

Add key art or a level screenshot as the Reference image, and Lyria scores the track to its mood and theme. Keep the genre and instruments in the prompt.

What to avoid

Expecting a negative prompt

Lyria 3, 3 Pro and 3.5 have no negative prompt. Put what you don't want in the prompt. For a track with no voice, write "Instrumental only, no vocals" and leave out lyrics.

Naming an artist or a song

Prompts that ask for an artist's voice or copyrighted lyrics are blocked. Describe the style, the era and the instruments instead.

Editing a track with a follow-up

Each run starts fresh, and the same prompt gives a different track every time. To change a track, change one thing in the prompt and run it again; run a few takes and keep the best.

Using the file straight from the board

Lyria 3.5 tracks opened with a second or more of near silence and ended with about two seconds of it in our tests. Trim both before the track goes into the game. Every track also came back at the same loudness, peaking at full scale, so set its level in the game's mix.

Settings that matter

Everything about the music goes in the prompt. Reference image takes one image to score to. Prompt language tells the model which language the prompt is written in, if it isn't English.

Prompts to start from

Main-menu theme (Lyria 3 Pro)

Orchestral fantasy main-menu theme for a cosy adventure game, 30 seconds long. Mood: warm, hopeful, wondering. Concert harp, solo French horn, warm string section, soft celesta, light timpani. 84 BPM, D major. [0:00-0:08] Intro: harp arpeggios alone, quiet. [0:08-0:24] Main theme: the horn carries the melody over full strings and gentle timpani. [0:24-0:30] Outro: strings resolve on a held D major chord and fade out. Instrumental only, no vocals.

Full-length theme (Lyria 3.5)

Orchestral fantasy main-menu theme for a cosy adventure game. Mood: warm, hopeful, wondering. Concert harp, solo French horn, warm string section, soft celesta, light timpani. 84 BPM, D major. The horn carries the melody over full strings and gentle timpani. Instrumental only, no vocals.

Use it in Layer

  1. In a session, open Create music from the side panel.

  2. Click the model name at the top of the panel and choose Lyria 3 Pro.

  3. In the prompt box, write the genre and job, the mood, the instruments, the tempo and key, the timeline, and whether it has vocals.

  4. Click Create music. The cost shows on the button before you click.

  5. When the track lands on the board, click View to play it. Change one thing in the prompt at a time and run it again.

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