01
What is Marabi™?
Marabi is a music radio app for Apple Music that learns your taste. Give it one or more artists or songs you love and it builds an endless station of tracks that match — not just the genre, but the actual sound. As you react (thumbs up, thumbs down, or simply keep listening), the station learns and adapts.
The app takes its name from a South African musical style born in the shebeens of 1920s Johannesburg — fluid, improvisational, built from whoever walked through the door. Like the music, Marabi meets you where you are and builds something new from what you bring.
Marabi plays through your Apple Music subscription on iPhone, iPad and Apple TV, with companion apps for Apple Watch and CarPlay.
02
Requirements
iPhone / iPad
iOS 26.5 / iPadOS 26.5 or later and an active Apple Music subscription
Apple TV
tvOS 26.5 or later, signed in to Apple Music
Apple Watch
watchOS 26.5 or later, paired with an iPhone running Marabi
CarPlay
Any CarPlay-equipped car with the iPhone app installed
Marabi streams full tracks from the Apple Music catalogue. Without a subscription the app can search but cannot play.
03
Getting started
1
Allow Apple Music access
On first launch, read the short intro and tap Get Started, then Allow Apple Music Access when iOS asks. If you previously declined, go to Settings → Privacy & Security → Media & Apple Music and turn Marabi on.
2
Add seeds
Tap the search field, type an artist or song, and tap a result to add it as a seed. One to five seeds with a similar sound give the best first hour.
3
Start the station
Tap Start station. Marabi finds matching tracks, builds a musical fingerprint from your seeds and starts playing within seconds. Prefer a shortcut? Tap Explore by genre, use the Marabi AI Prompt, or press Play a Marabi Style Music Station for a surprise.
04
Building a station
Search for seeds
Search works on artist names and song titles. Song seeds are precise — Marabi uses that recording’s fingerprint; artist seeds are broader.
Explore by genre
Thirty-four curated starting points: every decade from the 60s onward, Afrobeat, blues, bossa nova, Cape jazz, cumbia, Ethio-jazz, fado, flamenco, funk, gnawa, gospel and more. Tapping a genre starts a station instantly. The genres you use most move to the front of the row.
Add a seed mid-station
While a station is playing, tap + Seed to add another artist or song. The station DNA blends in the new influence immediately without restarting. If the station was loaded from your saved list, the new seed is saved back to it automatically.
05
Marabi™ AI Prompt
Instead of picking seed artists, describe the mood, occasion or sound you want. Tap the search field and switch to the Marabi AI Prompt tab, then type something like “Late-night Cape Town jazz with warm piano, slow and soulful” or “Driving 80s new wave with heavy synths”.
Tap Analyse Prompt. Marabi shows what it understood, the seed artists it chose and an opening playlist. Tap Start and the station plays exactly as if you had picked those seeds yourself — you can thumb, skip and sculpt it normally from there.
Marabi AI runs on your device using Apple Intelligence where available. Your prompt is not sent to Marabi’s developer.
06
Training your station
Thumbs up
Shifts the station DNA toward this track’s traits and lifts the artist for future picks. The track is added to your liked list.
Thumbs down
Bans this track and nudges the station away from its traits. The current track finishes playing.
Skip
Bans the track and moves straight to the next one.
Never play [artist]
Removes the artist from this and every future station. Undo any time in Settings → Banned artists.
Not Now
The moon icon in Up Next. Drops a queued track for this session only, with no penalty.
Just listening
Hearing a track to the end is a quiet positive signal; skipping in the first 30 seconds is a mild negative one.
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The match percentage
The percentage next to each track shows how well it fits your current taste profile: musical similarity to the station DNA (80%), your artist preferences from thumbs and listening time (14%), and the track’s overall popularity (6%).
A brand-new station scores in the 40–60% range because no preferences exist yet. As you react, artist affinity grows and pulls scores up — a well-trained station regularly shows 70–90%+ on good matches.
Once a day Marabi reads your most-played songs and recently added artists from your Apple Music library, so a fresh station already knows a little about your taste before you press anything.
08
Station DNA & Gene Sculptor
Every station has a living DNA made up of 11 musical traits. The barcode on the playing screen shifts as you react. Tap Sculpt (or the DNA card) to open the full breakdown.
Three barcodes are shown: YOUR TASTE (long-term profile), THIS SESSION (the active target, including any overrides) and NOW PLAYING (the current track’s fingerprint).
Gene Sculptor
Drag any trait slider from 0% to 100% to override it for this session — turn up Analog warmth, turn down Distortion. A badge shows the session value, your taste baseline and the difference (e.g. +25% vs taste). Tap ↺ next to a trait to revert it, or Reset to taste to clear every override. Tap any trait name to read what it measures.
The eleven traits
Energy
Intensity and drive — from barely-there ambience to relentless propulsion
Brightness
High-frequency sparkle: hi-hats, string bite, air above the mix
Groove
Rhythmic pocket and swing — how much the beat makes you move
Acoustic
Organic, unamplified texture — wood, gut and breath over electronics
Analog warmth
Tape warmth and tube saturation — the glow of analogue circuitry
Rhythmic detail
Percussion complexity and density — how busy and layered the beat is
Vocal presence
How prominent and forward the vocals sit in the mix
Vocal grit
Rasp, grain and rawness in the voice — a lived-in texture
Distortion
Crunch, overdrive and saturation — from light bite to full noise
Harmonic richness
Chord complexity and tonal richness — dense voicings score high
Space / air
Reverb, room and atmospheric depth — how much the sound breathes
09
Interactive Lineage Graph
Under Marabi AI DJ Insight in the Station DNA sheet, the app maps the current track’s musical family tree: Influences that shaped the sound, Contemporaries from the same scene, and Descendants who carried it forward.
Tap any artist pill to graft them into your station as a new seed. The DNA adapts instantly.
10
Playback controls & variety
The Variety slider sets how far the station roams:
Narrow (green, left)
Only your seed artists play — focused and predictable.
Familiar (amber, centre)
A seed-heavy mix with similar artists blended in. The everyday setting.
Wild (red, right)
Exploration mode — seed artists appear rarely and the station reaches far outside its starting influences. The jump past the midpoint is deliberate.
Skip vs thumbs down: Skip bans the track and advances immediately. Thumbs down records the dislike but lets the current track finish.
11
Up Next queue
Scroll down on the playing screen (or look to the right on iPad and Apple TV) to see what the station intends to play, with each track’s match percentage.
Tap the moon on a queued track to drop it for this session without banning it. Tap thumbs down to ban it from all future stations.
12
Saved stations & seed editing
1
Save a station
While a station plays, tap the gold Save station button next to the station name, give it a name and tap Save. The button changes to Saved. Saved stations remember their seeds so you can rebuild them later.
2
Save your last session
Ended a station without saving? On the home screen tap Saved Stations — your last session is listed at the top. Tap Save to name and keep it, or the play button to resume it as-is.
3
Load, rename, edit, delete
Tap the play button on any saved station to rebuild it. Tap the pencil to rename it, the green people icon to edit its seeds (swipe left on a seed to remove it, or search to add more), or swipe left on the station to delete it.
Saved stations sync between your iPhone, iPad and Apple TV through iCloud. Liked tracks, bans and your taste profile stay on each device.
13
Sync to Flow & banned artists
Sync to Flow
Turn on Sync to Flow in Settings → Playback and your station follows the day: brighter tempo, more energy and groove in the morning and daytime; slower, more acoustic and spacious late at night. It only nudges the target — your seeds and taste still lead.
Banned artists
To exclude an artist for good, tap Never play [artist] under the transport controls and confirm. To review or unban, go to Settings → Banned artists and swipe left on a name. Settings → Data also lets you clear play history, banned tracks or liked tracks.
14
AirPlay & audio output
Tap the speaker chip (it shows the current output, for example iPhone) on the home or playing screen to open the AirPlay picker. Route to a HomePod, Apple TV or any AirPlay speaker on your network. The volume slider on the playing screen controls the level; the hardware volume buttons work too.
Marabi plays through the Apple Music player, so playback continues in the background and shows in Control Centre and on the lock screen like any other music.
15
Marabi™ on Apple TV
1
Standalone
Marabi for Apple TV is included with the app. Sign in to Apple Music on the TV, grant access when asked, and build stations with the Siri Remote — type, or hold the microphone button and say an artist. Thumbs, skip, variety, Save Station and AirPlay to other rooms all live on the station screen.
2
Two screens, one station
Open Marabi on both your iPhone and Apple TV on the same Wi-Fi and they link automatically. Whichever device is producing the sound owns the station; the other mirrors it and keeps every control. Start on the phone, open the TV app, and the TV takes over at the same second. Close the TV app and playback hands back to the phone. Use Play on this iPhone instead to take it back sooner.
3
Living screensaver
After 30 seconds without a press, the TV becomes a canvas: the artwork drifts over a wash of its own colours driven by the track’s genome, with the match ring, audio-quality badge, variety setting, a clock and what’s next. Swipe right to skip, left to go back; any other press returns. Turn it off under Settings → Auto ambient screensaver.
The first time the apps link, tvOS and iOS may ask for Local Network permission. Allow it — the link is strictly between your own devices on your Wi-Fi.
Shebeen mode
Friends over? Any iPhone running Marabi on the same Wi-Fi links to the Apple TV and lends its long-term taste profile. The TV blends the guests’ profiles into a collaborative centroid and folds it into the live station, so picks lean toward what the room agrees on. The badge at the top shows how many guests are in.
A guest’s influence lifts the moment their phone leaves. Nobody’s own profile is changed — guests colour the station, they don’t retrain it.
16
Apple Watch
The watch app shows the current artist, title and match, with play/pause, skip, thumbs up and thumbs down. Scroll down for the variety slider, Gentle/DJ mode and your saved stations — tap one to start it on the phone without taking it out.
The phone app does not need to be open: the watch wakes it in the background. If the watch shows “out of range”, bring it closer to the phone or open Marabi on the phone once.
To keep Marabi on your wrist longer after you lower it, set Watch Settings → General → Return to Clock for Marabi.
17
CarPlay & lock screen
CarPlay
Marabi appears on the CarPlay home screen. The first tab lists your saved stations and your last session; the Genres tab starts any curated station. The Now Playing screen has play/pause, skip, thumbs up, thumbs down, Never play this artist and End. Everything you do in the car trains the station.
Lock screen & Dynamic Island
While a station plays, a Live Activity shows the current track and station with play/pause and skip. The system Now Playing controls (Control Centre, headphones, car buttons) work too — a next-track press advances the station exactly like Skip in the app.
18
Troubleshooting
“Apple Music subscription required”
Marabi needs an active subscription to stream. Check Settings → [Your Name] → Subscriptions, or open the Music app and confirm you can play a catalogue song. Family plans and trials work.
Station won’t start / search returns nothing
Confirm Marabi has permission under Settings → Privacy & Security → Media & Apple Music and that you are online. Very obscure seeds may have too few matching tracks — add a second, better-known artist.
Music stops mid-track
Usually an interruption from another app (a call, Siri, navigation). Tap play to resume. If the station seems stuck, tap End and resume it from Saved Stations → Last session.
AirPlay handoff takes a few seconds
Normal. When you change AirPlay destination the Music system needs a moment to negotiate the new route; Marabi detects it and carries on.
Saved stations missing on another device
Saved stations sync through iCloud. Make sure both devices are signed in with the same Apple Account and iCloud Drive is on. Give it a minute after saving.
iPhone and Apple TV don’t link
Both must be on the same Wi-Fi (not a guest network) with Marabi in the foreground. Check Local Network permission under Settings → Privacy & Security → Local Network on the iPhone. Closing and reopening either app re-establishes the link.
Apple TV says “Building your station…” for a long time
Press Menu to go home and start again. If it repeats, check the TV’s Apple Music sign-in under Settings → Users and Accounts.
Watch shows an old station
The watch remembers the last station it heard about. Raise your wrist or open the app; it asks the phone for the current state and refreshes within a few seconds.
19
Privacy & contact
Marabi has no account and collects no analytics or usage telemetry. Your taste profile, likes, bans, play history and saved stations stay on your devices and in your private iCloud. Track lookups go to Apple Music and to public music-metadata services (Deezer, MusicBrainz, Last.fm) and carry no personal information.
For bug reports or feature requests, email jdapplications@icloud.com. Please include your device, OS version and the Marabi version shown in Settings → About.
Apple Music, Apple TV, Apple Watch and CarPlay are trademarks of Apple Inc.