iTunes not following proper sorting hierarchy (Sort Album Artist is NOT taking precedence).

esumsea wrote:

I don't understand. I thought apple support reps monitored this forum.

Only to maintain good behaviour. Apple do state that the forum is a user-to-user forum, although occasionally an Apple employee may contribute to a discussion. However, experience suggests that they are not always best placed to provide an - or the - answer. Sometimes, no one knows how to help.

To address the issue that brought you here:

Perhaps no one really understood what you were having issues with. I spotted your post on the 11th September (having not spotted your original post of the 5th September), but didn't believe I had anything to contribute to the discussion.

Let's confirm what you're looking at, how you're looking for it and what you expect to see. Here's a screenshot of part of my library, in the Songs view:

• I've set my Songs view to sort by Album by Artist, hence the bold title column; Album by Artist
• the arrow on the right hand end of the column (Album by Artist) indicates the direction that is being used to sort the column (i.e. arrow up is A-Z while arrow down is Z-A)
• to toggle this field between the options, one has to click on the Album column header first (Album is the default) and then click in the gap between the header text (Album) and the arrow on the right in order to switch between:
  • Album
  • Album by Artist
  • Album by Artist/Year
  • Album
• Sorting by Album by Artist can be non-intuitive (yes, that is the phrase I intended). Although the Album by Artist column is in bold text (which usually indicates the column that is being used to sort), in this case, it isn't. The sort is nominally the Artist column, to the left in my screenshot). But don't forget, it's actually the Album Artist field that is being used, not the Artist field. The sort will use the Artist field if the Album Artist field is blank
• In the screenshot below, I've added in the Album Artist column (2, ringed in orange). As you can see, the album Yves Klein Blue does not have any text in the Album Artist field, so the Artist field (1) (Acrilic Colors) is used instead. However...

• if you try to sort by the Album Artist column (2), all albums with an empty Album Artist field will be placed after all other entries and it looks as though it's by album title, not artist. This means that the album Yves Klein Blue by Acrilic Colors will now be placed after Z, the Russian alphabet and numbers:

• As you can see in the above screenshot, although we're sorting by the Album Artist column, the actual sort field is the two ringed areas, so part of the left column and part of the right column. I didn't know this until just now, when I tried it in order to answer your post

I don't know whether this helps or not, you will have to let us know. But maybe it provides an insight that might help you decide how to sort in the future.

I forgot to put in the following detail, although it wasn't strictly necessary:

Note the A-Z sorting of the album column in my last screenshot:

• • • Ab Origine
    • Abandoned
    • Abbey road
    • About Time
    • above the clouds
    • Absolute Soul

The remainder of my library sorts this way too.

I get the idea. I notice you seem to prefer Jazz, a genre that seems to be prone to contributing artists. Some of the Jazz albums I have are by artists who are billed as solo artists, but with additional musicians who are not necessarily billed as guest artists.

For example, the album Three by Bob James has Ralph MacDonald, Eric Gale and Grover Washington Jr. all playing on it. Yes, they are credited in the album notes, but they are not billed as guest artists. Meanwhile, the Eric Gale album Ginseng Woman has Ralph MacDonald, Grover Washington Jr. and Bob James playing on various tracks. Ralph MacDonald also plays on Grover Washington's album Winelight, as does Eric Gale, but not (as far as I'm aware) Bob James.

So, I think what you would like to do is compile lists that have (for example) Eric Gale's own albums plus tracks he has played on.

How about making use of iTunes' comments field and the grouping field, and using sub-playlists? Don't forget, a Smart Playlist can look at other Smart Playlists.

For example (and yes, if you try this, it probably means that you will have to do some work, but I get the impression that's not an issue);

• suppose a track includes three specific musicians that you want to look for, type all three names into the comments field. Let's use Ralph MacDonald (since I have only tracks that he plays on, but none of his own albums), Eric Gale (I do have one album by him) and Harvey Mason
• then create three separate Smart Playlists:
  • a Smart Playlist named Ralph, that has a rule "comments - contains - Ralph MacDonald" (this ensures that Ralph Mctell is not included*)
  • a Smart Playlist named Eric that has the rule "comments - contains - Eric Gale" and a further rule "Artist - is - Eric Gale" (note the difference between "contains" and "is")
  • a Smart Playlist named Harvey that has the rule "comments - contains - Harvey Mason"

Suppose that you now wish to have a further Playlist that includes tracks either Eric or Harvey, but not Ralph. Create another Smart playlist that has the following rules:

• • Playlist - is - Eric
  • Playlist - is - Harvey

... and so on. Don't forget that a rule in a Smart Playlist can be "does not contain" as well as further options to exclude specific terms or words. To minimise problems, I recommend that you do not refer playlists back to each other (in other words, don't go round in circles) and to make your playlists easy to follow, don't have more references than you need.

Examples of my Smart Playlists:

• • one that refers to three Regular Playlists
  • one that excludes a different Smart Playlist
  • one that refers to three Smart Playlists, at least one of which has four rules

* Thinking about it, the Playlist looking for Ralph MacDonald might give you some trouble with Ralph Mctell, depending what you create, but that is why you may need to experiment a bit. (This paragraph was added after initial posting.)

esumsea wrote:

I guess Apple really has no interest in making a music manager, especially since they want to sell you their streaming service that basically replaces it.

Bingo!

• • Revenue made directly from iTunes as a programme that manages an individual's music library: not a brass farthing
  • Indirect revenue as a result of iTunes, when it was the only way to get apps and music onto devices; considerable. Indirect revenue as a result of purchasing apps and music directly on the device, considerable. No need for iTunes.
  • Revenue from streaming, managed directly on the device, without the need of iTunes. I'm guessing "quite a bit".

What is actually need is a stand-alone music manager that is at least as good as Tunes, but preferably builds on its success. iTunes is no longer used on recent MacOS systems, and without even speculating (which Apple don't allow here), I just wonder what's gong to happen in the future? I personally don't think Window Media Player is even in the running. I've used it and it is not user-friendly, despite claims to the contrary. Despite its faults and limitations (some of which I experience), iTunes is an excellent music manager.

Out of interest, I looked at the site you mentioned, but I can't say I was impressed. Yes, a lot of work has gone into those scripts, but:

• a script that adds gaps between each track.
  • In a discussion in 2012 it was suggested that there was no easy way to do this, but I pointed out (in that discussion) that all that was needed was to use an audio recording programme to create a mp3 of a few seconds of silence and then add that into the required place. I also pointed out that there was a website that had downloadable mp3s of silence in various lengths. That site is still active today, I've just checked. (http://duramecho.com/Misc/SilentCd/index.html)
• a script that allows you to rip from CD in a specific format, without changing the Import Settings in iTunes and for that format to remain as your chosen format once the script has run.
  • I'm sorry, but I fail to see what advantage this has over using iTunes' settings, which would appear to do exactly that, but without someone else's contribution
• a script that allows you to batch manage Playlists; including renaming playlists, merging, moving playlists to Playlist Folders, as well as changing the View As, Sort By and Column Browser settings.
  • I must be missing something. How much renaming of playlists does anyone need to do that makes using a script quicker and easier than selecting the playlist and renaming it? Moving a Playlist to a Playlist Folder: I have never, ever, needed a script to do such a simple task. As for changing the views; I have my preferred view. On occasions I have changed it, sometimes for my own benefit and sometimes in order to test/check views for people here. I then change it back. It's not difficult

Call me a grumpy old man, but I'm not won over.

I do however, want a music player that allows me to choose any one of multiple views and change those views easily, something that allows me to correct typing errors, change the genre, create and manage Playlists, create Smart Playlists (one of iTunes' best features in my mind) and one that makes it easy to add music to the player's database (I really don't understand WMP's way of doing that). iTunes can do all of this with ease.

I could go on, but all the time that clever people are creating scripts to do what iTunes can already do, rather than developing a terrific successor to iTunes (and add it to any portable device), I see my future ability to play and manage my music library as somewhat bleak.

esumsea wrote:

I really don't understand iTunes' reticence in including an all artists field (or many others like Conductor), as their style guide for tagging music for artists specifically has a place for it. It is just data. In fact it would be nice to also include the instrument played by the Artist, for fastidious types.

I believe Steve Jobs thought up the idea of iTunes and he - to the best of my knowledge - was thinking only about non-classical music (in other words, pop and rock). Hence, no provision was made for the demands of classical music enthusiasts. That's not really surprise, the iPod was considered unworthy of classical music at that time.

However, since then, iTunes has introduced the Work and Movement tags, something that many classical lovers expressed a desire for. To be honest, all the things you want to do are far more than iTunes was ever going to be capable of. It's regarded as far too complex as it stands now. If everything you are after was added, the naysayers would have a meltdown.

What you need is a separate programme, into which you could put all this information.

I am actually thinking of buying a mac to manage my iTunes library and to have the ability to run Doug's scripts, which would greatly improve my experience, but I don't think that would give me any tools to help me with this dilemma.

I'm not sure who you are talking about, unless you mean a chap named Doug Williams, who has a presence on a well known social media platform and who says "Thanks Fredrik" a lot. More to the point though, before you buy a Mac, remember that the latest versions of Mac OS (Catalina and Big Sur) do not use iTunes at all. You can't (to the best of my knowledge) install iTunes on those Macs. Instead, they use Finder, but I've no idea how sophisticated it is compared to iTunes.

All I can now suggest in addition to what I've already suggested, is that you look around for a stand-alone programme that will allow you to compile the information you want. There was such a programme, but it's no longer available to new users.

You're welcome. Please do report back, it will be interesting to know what you make of this.