Sync Settings - no Artist when Albums tab is selected

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Level 1

5 points

Sync Settings - no Artist when Albums tab is selected

I just upgraded to Catalina, and am walking through the new Music app. Unfortunately, I'm running into an issue when viewing my iPhone location and selecting 'Music'. On iTunes, I used to hand-select my music by Album, but unfortunately when I select the 'Albums' tab, all I see are albums without an associated column for artist.

This is a terrible customer experience, as there's no way for me to sort this list by Artist. Am I missing something? I don't want to sync music by artist, as it would be rare for me to want the entire catalog of an artist at a time on my iPhone. It seems like a gross oversight not to include the ability to pick through a sorted artists catalog for music to sync to your device.

Posted on Oct 10, 2019 11:05 PM

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Answer 1

turingtest2

Level 10

272,773 points

Oct 17, 2019 1:58 PM in response to clutch10

Use Product Feedback - Apple to let Apple know what you want.

I'm using Apple Music these days, but I used to have a single main playlist for each of my family's devices, and sometimes the odd smart playlist to rotate a bit of content automatically. I'd use a regular playlist for the main list and a smart playlist that showed what wasn't in the main list. A simple matter to scan through that list looking for anything crying out to be included, or take requests from family members for what needed adding to theirs. I could manage what was going to go onto each device without connecting it first, and restore the state of it if needed without having to recall all of the individual selections.

tt2

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Answer 2

Oct 16, 2019 11:29 AM in response to clutch10

This is a MAJOR problem for users with several thousand albums in their library. Just take the example of how many album titles in a library that size are titled “Greatest Hits”! It’s now a crap shoot to determine if you have selected the album that you wanted to sync or not. PLEASE FIX THIS APPLE!!!

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Answer 3

clutch10 Author

Level 1

5 points

Oct 17, 2019 11:00 AM in response to AndyCasale

Totally agree - it's hard for me to fathom how such a terrible design choice made it through to release. For users like us who have large collection with album titles that repeat (e.g. the "Greatest Hits" example cited above), it's now pretty much hit-or-miss as to whether you're syncing the right album.

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Answer 4

clutch10 Author

Level 1

5 points

Oct 17, 2019 1:06 PM in response to turingtest2

I agree that the Genre and Artist selection boxes were a waste, and I never used them. But I exclusively used the Albums selection box to curate the music on my iPhone. I use Playlists for mixes only; having to create even more Playlists to add specific Artists or Albums would be an even bigger time-sink. I'd rather just be able to add the albums I want, a la carte, the way I used to be able to.

The bottom line is, offering an Albums selection box with no Artist context, makes absolutely no sense.

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Answer 5

clutch10 Author

Level 1

5 points

Oct 17, 2019 5:14 PM in response to McKweiss

I have a feeling I'm going to head down this route as well. There must be other 3rd-party programs that will do a decent job, at least as good as iTunes did (and probably/hopefully better). This is pretty much a non-starter for me as well.

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Answer 6

turingtest2

Level 10

272,773 points

Oct 17, 2019 11:48 AM in response to clutch10

Revert to the original method of syncing with selected playlists. I always thought adding separate selection boxes for genres, artists, and albums was an unnecessary complication.

tt2

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Answer 7

McKweiss

Level 1

4 points

Oct 17, 2019 1:14 PM in response to clutch10

Does anyone have any experience working with other music management programs on Macs? This glitch is a complete non starter for me.

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Answer 8

Oct 19, 2019 5:44 AM in response to AndyCasale

I couldn't agree more. Very disappointed. And in addition to that I have another example: album with identical title from different artist...it's a disaster.

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Sync Settings - no Artist when Albums tab is selected

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