How to organize and tag classical music

[DavidHB]

(10-10-2014 19:00)Dieter Stockert Wrote:  

(10-10-2014 18:11)DavidHB Wrote:  For most genres other than classical, the album continues to have a strong identity as an often coherent and carefully designed body of work by a particular artist or group. Or, as a compilation, it presents a themed set of material. These concepts are alive and well, and you find them in the classical world also [...].

Good point, I think you're right. So we should look at every album if it makes sense to keep it as an album or if it is meaningless.

It will always have some sort of meaning. In the common case where we are ripping a CD, the containing folder will have to have a name, and normally the best name is the name of the album (that is the same as the Album tag in the files within the folder - consistency is something of a virtue here).

One of the user choices I do make with classical albums is to change the album title when ripping the CD, so as to maintain a reasonably consistent format. My practice is never to include the composer's name (because in my file system album folders always reside either in the relevant composer folder, the recitals folder or the compilation folder), and typically to have album names in the format 'Symphonies 4 and 6 [Karajan]' or whatever. I find that album titles of that sort help me select the performance I wish to listen to.

(10-10-2014 19:00)Dieter Stockert Wrote:  

(10-10-2014 18:11)DavidHB Wrote:  As I see it, streaming the music does not do away with the need for albums, but it tends to change the way they are used. [...]

If you 'get rid' of the album, the question arises as to what you replace it with.

In classical music we have opus or 'work'.

Indeed we do. But what about recitals, where the running order is as important as the content of the individual works? Classical music is such a rich genre (if it is a genre - I would say it is much more than that); there is no one way in which we can select all the pieces we wish to listen to, in the sequence we wish to listen to them.

That said, my album titling described above brings me quite close to your mindset. As I hope you would agree, the default logic for choosing classical music to listen to is Composer -> work -> performance/artist(s). When that logic is used, the album (or at least its artwork) is merely the signpost to the chosen performance. But sometimes we do not use the default logic; a favourite album may have its own identity, or we simply want to use a saved playlist. Having that kind of choice is very much part of the fun, and maintaining the range of selection options, in my view, enriches the user experience.

David