Apple Intelligence is now available on iPhone, iPad, and Mac!

Looks like no one’s replied in a while. To start the conversation again, simply ask a new question.

Music.app seems to forget ALL settings, sometimes.

Music.app seems to forget ALL settings, sometimes.


Macbook Pro 2012 Retina Display

macOS Catalina with all updates as of May 2023

Most recent available version of Music.app


Due to local hard drive space issues, I recently moved my entire Music Library to a 1TB SD card. Most of the time, everything is fine. SOMETIMES, when I open Music.app, it opens up like I have never used iTunes.app or Music.app ever before. All my Music Library files are still there.


There is no way to just tell Music.app "There's my library, take it in."

I do change the storage folder to the existing Music Library location, but it doesn't import all of that.

I log in to my Apple Account in Music.app and the app wants to download ALL of my music stored in iCloud. There are many problems with this.

  1. It's a terabyte of data.
  2. The files are ALREADY RIGHT THERE. So I'd need another 1TB of storage to redownload my entire library.
  3. This happens more than once a month. My monthly internet cap is 1.2 TB.
  4. When I do let it start downloading, it doesn't recognize that the files are already there and downloads a duplicate * 1.* named file.
  5. Music Match or iCloud or iTunes or wtvr the service is called wants to replace my personally created high resolution lossless recordings with the 3 256kbps files. So... like I have backups of those of course. But what the heck???
  6. This is all just absolutely terrible.


plz help.


[Edited by Moderator]


MacBook Pro 15″

Posted on May 6, 2023 5:07 PM

Reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on May 7, 2023 11:50 AM

It would seem Music might be using the cached file in lieu of anything else. See Managing your Mac media libraries - Apple Community for general background on where everything should normally be. You can option-start-Music to create a new library in the default location of ~/Music/Music. If your media is on a different drive it may be best to move the library into <Drive>/Music above your current <Drive>/Music/Media folder, then option-start-Music to reconnect to it on that path.


tt2

Similar questions

15 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

May 7, 2023 11:50 AM in response to Gryphon MacThoy

It would seem Music might be using the cached file in lieu of anything else. See Managing your Mac media libraries - Apple Community for general background on where everything should normally be. You can option-start-Music to create a new library in the default location of ~/Music/Music. If your media is on a different drive it may be best to move the library into <Drive>/Music above your current <Drive>/Music/Media folder, then option-start-Music to reconnect to it on that path.


tt2

May 7, 2023 3:32 AM in response to Gryphon MacThoy

See Empty/corrupt iTunes/Music library after upgrade/crash - Apple Community. Look for .tmp files inside the Music Libary.musiclibrary package. Make sure to close Music fully before turning off your Mac. Backup your library database when the library is working correctly so you have something that you can restore. Do you have any third party security software? If so exclude the Music folder from real time scanning.


tt2

May 7, 2023 10:29 AM in response to turingtest2

two things:

  1. Yes. I see that everything from Apple Music has to be redownloaded even though it is already present. This is part of the problem as I originally described. This is not a feature. It’s a problem.
  2. Yes. I know I have to reimport everything. And then it wants to upload everything to the iCloud again. All nearly 1TB. And it reconciles … badly? Incompletely, at best. One time it made a duplicate of literally everything in iCloud. Another time it only duplicated about 20%. Again, this is the nature of the problem as I have originally described.


Music.app resets to factory defaults, and then to fix it I have to use up at least 80% of my monthly internet allotment.


I’d like to not care about reimporting absolutely everything and redownloading and reuploading absolutely everything. I’d like to know where the Music.app keeps all of its settings so I could restore them from Time Machine, at least. Or figure out WHY Music.app loses its settings and stop that.

May 7, 2023 8:35 AM in response to turingtest2

I read the linked article. None of it seems relevant. I have not recently upgraded to Catalina. This is a new phenomenon since relocating my Music folder to a new location. The move itself went fine. Afterwards, the Music.app started forgetting everything. Not just the local music directory location, but EVERYTHING, like my login and settings and everything. It’s as if a plist somewhere got deleted. But that’s the thing now. I see the new default Music folder is in Library Caches? Or at least the Apple Music downloaded content is? It’s all very confusing and scattered.


Preventing the problem would be great. But how do I get the Music.app to recognize that all 950GB of music it wants to download from the iCloud is already there in its target directory?

May 7, 2023 9:31 AM in response to Gryphon MacThoy

Your active Music library file will typically be called Music Library.musiclibrary but the .musiclibrary file extension may be hidden. The default location is ~/Music/Music where ~ is your home folder. Did you move the media folder, or the whole library? There can be a cached version of the library which may be used to support syncing or home sharing even when Music isn't running.


If you cannot find an older version of the library to restore, or a useful .tmp file within the package that can be renamed to replace the library, then you can import your locally stored media. Music should then reconcile this with the content stored in the cloud so that you don't have to redownload everything.


tt2

May 7, 2023 9:41 AM in response to Gryphon MacThoy

Setting the media folder in preferences doesn't add anything to the library. You need to use File > Import or File > Add to Library to add your locally stored files. Music should resolve the tracks you add against your iCloud Music Library so the tracks you've added don't show as duplicates of the cloud content. Note that anything from the Apple Music subscription service cannot be imported in this way and will need to deleted and redownloaded.


tt2

May 8, 2023 8:36 PM in response to turingtest2

Getting back to this. I have tried everything and cannot get around this message when I create a new library:

"You cannot change the music library at this time because the current library is in use by a device. Sign in without connected devices to change your music library."

Does this mean I have to log out of Apple Music or iTunes Music Match or iCloud or ... what? I don't know what it means by "Devices" here.

May 10, 2023 4:12 PM in response to turingtest2

You nailed it. I found these solutions elsewhere after I reviewed all the links you sent. I ended up taking my machine off networking and rebooting. Then I could make an new library (and now I have that .musiclibrary pkg) and the. Following a synthesis of those articles you share and other notes I made a symlink to point the physical storage to my 1TB SD Card. This appears to have solved the problem, but I need a n few weeks of stability before I’ll call it a done deal.


This whole thing is very frustrating. It seems overly complicated for the end user to manage or recovery from problems. I have a long list of things to send as Feedback.

Music.app seems to forget ALL settings, sometimes.

Welcome to Apple Support Community
A forum where Apple customers help each other with their products. Get started with your Apple Account.