Playing an mp3 file from the assets folder with Angular?

Question

Trying to play an mp3 file with howler.js from the assets folder in the latest version of Angular.

I put an MP3 in src/assets/mp3/lost-in-sands-126335.mp3.

 audio % ls src/assets/mp3/lost-in-sands-126335.mp3 
src/assets/mp3/lost-in-sands-126335.mp3

This is what I have within the constructor of app.component:

  mp3URL:string = 'assets/mp3/lost-in-sands-126335.mp3';
  constructor() {
     const song = new Howl({
      //  autoplay: true,
      loop: true,
      volume: 1,
      format: ['mp3'],
      src: [this.mp3URL],
    });    
   song.play();
   console.log(`IS THE SONG PLAYING: `, song.playing());

When the application is served ng serve -o the song does not start playing (The console log of song.playing() is false.

Any ideas?