Multiple Artists and Genres per Song

"And it's a pretty old request too - dated from 2003."

It's quite simple to understand why Apple continue to ignore this sugesstion since introducing this feature in iTunes will not make Apple any money. they lost their soul with the iPod in 2001 and lost all hope of getting it back in 2007 when they released the iPhone. Apple is now a money machine just like the Microsofts of this world except they still pretend to be caring, sharing altruistic etc.

In fact this feature is already available from Apple.... In the iTunes STORE.

For example if you browse violinist 'David Garrett' the iTunes Store will list both his individual songs AND his collaborations with other artists such as the 'Royal Philharmonic Orchestra' (all available for just 0.79p!!!) I'm sorry if I sound like a cynical troll but this quite annoys me.

Apple have obviously developed the feature but then decided not to incorporate it into iTunes perhaps because they think it will 'complicate' the program for their core market... but does their 'core market' not use the store? The store is designed very well to 'streamline' customers from A to P(urchase) and one of the ways to do this is to incude intelligent tagging so that a customer does not 'miss out' on the opportunity to buy a track just because it doesn't match with the 'primary artist tag'

The only way I can see Apple introducing this feature is if they dont have anything more pressing on their advertising agenda and their marketing department find a way of making a snazzy ad video about how this feature is wonderful, amazing, and 'new'.

N.B. I'm not a professional just a normal user with a diverse library.

Well said comment...

The solution to this problem overall is simple.

If I pull out my Ipod, and go to the section to browse by artist, then all artists would be listed individually in the list if they are separated in a song by the '&' symbol. In the main music list in itunes, this would not result in multiple copies of the file.

The same situation would apply in the genre browser. If there is a tag with "POP & Chinese" then the song would appear if I was searching in pop OR Chinese. It would not show a Genre called "POP & Chinese" in the genre browser. It would show POP and Chinese SEPARATELY in the list!!!

This is not a issue of some programming esoterica nor does it require some super genius to figure out.

Wake up Apple programmers....

Even smartlists are broken in the ipad/ipod and don't work the same way as they do in itunes. WHAT ARE YOU DOING WITH THAT A5X chip that you can't fix this problem? I make a smartlist for the genre section at least and this allows me to accomplish what I stated above with genres by using the smartlists instead of the genre browser.

The artist browser and genre browser are worthless to me... since MANY of my songs have multi-artist and multi-genre separated by '&' and the stupid browser lists all the permutations instead of delimiting the genres and artists.

My genre list looks sorta like this:

Pop & chinese & instrumental

Pop & japanese

Pop & Soundtrack & Anime & Japanese

Pop & score & anime

Pop & chinese & vocal

Pop & electronica

What a mess... but I can't categorize my stuff any other way without making it hard to decide which place to put a song. Does a chinese soundtrack pop song get filed under chinese? or pop? or soundtrack? I SHOULD be able to find the song regardless of which sub-genre I look under in the genre browser.

This is basically simple. The people that understand this are basically right and Apple is WRONG on this... no matter what detractors on this thread say. The devices and software could easily be tweaked to dramatically improve the user experience but Apple is poor at getting involved in discussion forums like this to allow us to help them fix these issues. Some of the product developers on the app store are far more receptive to suggestions than Apple is. They are not getting enough of the advantages of crowd sourcing.

I would fly out to Cupertino and correct MANY UI mistakes/errors for them if they will have me out there...

I'll hold my breath and wait for a message to have me come out there. There are still a lot of things about OSX and iOS that can be made simpler too. still FAR too much extraneous junk and poor implementation of cloud capabilities.

Why on earth does itunes have a "get info" menu dropdown to get into track data? Why is the track data separated into 7 submenus separated by tabs? The whole data entry situation in itunes is way too complex. It's downright painful.

Why are there no 24bit audio files yet for premium prices? Are the people at apple doing too much LSD? WHAT IS GOING ON? You have to be disabled not to hear the difference between great recordings and that 256kbps garbage the peddle. come to my house on the 107db sensitivity speakers with a Class A amplifier and tell me you can't tell the difference and I will have your hearing checked.

hopefully the itunes department will contact someone on this thread to provide a list of the mistakes in itunes/ipod software so the problems can all be fixed.

An AUDIOPHILE needs to take over itunes and fix this nonsense STAT. It's simply embarassing at this point. Where are my 24 bit files on my 1000gb ipod? WHY IS THERE NO AUDIOPHILE IPOD? They can use there 100 billion cash hoard and make a GOOD home distribution system beyond "airplay/airport".

Why is mediocrity being considered at Apple when they do so many other things great? Considering I own half a million dollars in stock, believe me I do appreciate the company at large. I am only ranting about the treatment of audiophiles and the complete dumbing down of the music experience to mass garbage when we live in the 21st century. What we see is important (retina display) but what we hear is not?

/rant off...

Apple feel free to contact me and I can tell you how to develop the BEST product for music ever implemented... I don't need compensation... I want products that I WANT to buy!!!!

Ed, here is an example of exactly what everybody is talking about:

1. What do i Tag Gwen Stefani as, compared to No Doubt? One is POP, one is Alternative or Ska. Both have the same artiest's.
2. What do I tag Thug story featuring Taylor Swift and T-Pain as? Rap or Country?
3. What do I tag Over and Over featuring Tim McGraw and Nelly?
4. What do I catalog Queen as? Rock, Retro, 70's? Depending on my age, it's different.

My point is, there are _several_ songs that are considered crossover by nature, taste and diversity therefore, they appear in multiple genera's. (This may be why the Genre section is no longer in iTunes.)

Bydisgn,

If you would like to suggest enhancements to Apple, you can use the iTunes Feedback page:

http://www.apple.com/feedback/itunesapp.html

I totally agree with everyone's comment here !! (except maybe ed2345...) .

Not only that music genres are subjectives, but they can represent a music style, a type of music or even an 'era' ! I mean take for instance Pink Floyd. It's definetly rock, but you could mark it psychedelic, philosophical or even soft rock. What about all those new indie bands that are rock, alternative and folk all together ? I'd even like to mark some '80's music' as they are not from the 80's but certainly play kind of 80's music ! And when they get popular, they become Pop ! Can't they still be folk ?? ... The black keys is a good exemple of this...

The only reason I would think apple would hold off on this is the devices... I mean if they enable that semicolon feature, they will also need to ensure the apple devices all work with it correctly ! You would probably see too many genres on your ipod\iphone device unless you update your device. That gap between the an iTunes and device upgrade could be a turn off for Apple, but I'm sure there is a way to force an ipod\iphone upgrade if you did it with itunes regardless of your device generation.

I don't even use my iPod (lost it and sync my music to my blackberry until my company upgrades to the iPhone) but love itunes and the istore... I'm confident adding that multiple genres options wouldn't be much for them!!!!!

Is there any hope for multiple genre/artist tagging or what? Besides media monkey, are there any mac-based alternative media players that provide this functionality?

Felipead, your post made me decide to send a suggestion to Apple and I decided to leave what I sent them here as well. I have made this template as a quick copy-paste deal so you guys can quickly submit this issue to Apple via their feedback page: http://www.apple.com/feedback/itunesapp.html

Feel free to edit this as needed, this was just a quick ten minute write up to get the point across to Apple. Please let Apple know that we demand these features in iTunes, wether you decide to use my template or your own.

---------------------------------------------------------

"The problem with iTunes is that it supports one single genre, and one single artist per song." - A concerned user nicknamed felipead addressed this issue on your forums.

It's true, going through any iPod that hosts music under the Genres; Classical, Rap, Techno, House, Dubstep, and similar genres, is a nightmare. Having to deal with making playlists to accommodate listening to all songs featuring a certain artist without fiddling with iTunes or iPod controls.

It's unsettling seeing two or more artists listed for an artists when it could be solved by simply allowing users to tag featuring artists so it shows the song under multiple artists and genres. This would keep the fluid feel of your already great product. I find it more upsetting that Windows media player has had this feature for years already.

Without a doubt you have been sent requests for better support for songs with multiple genres and artists, and I feel it's self destruction to make devices that hold up to 40,000 songs, but have no support for better grouping of songs. It's really just too infuriating searching for this music, and having to have duplicate songs to accommodate this issue.

I enjoy carrying my music library in it's entirety with me everywhere I go, but as an other non-DJ audiophile I demand these features for all the other audiophiles out there.

Looking forward to your support,

*YOUR NAME*

Felipead's issue in this thread:

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3091571?start=0&tstart=0

Its a funny feeling coming across this thread, as I have searched the Internet for a solution for just this very problem. Just recently I stopped using Windows Media Player completely and changed to iTunes, as I thought that could be just as well since I need iPods for training and the car and whatnot. So, why have more than one program, I thought.

The reason is what you describe so very well here. My problem is not so much the genres although that annoys me too, but mainly artists. It annoys me so greatly that a Daughtry-song featuring Slash (for example) can not be displayed correctly. In iTunes there as sort of work arounds if you disregard the search functions (which I find it hard to do), but on the iPod it doesn't work even a little. My options are either having the song removed from Daughtry's songs or not being displayed right.

I never thought a Windows product would be so far ahead of Apple, but so be it. Are there any real chances Apple will fix this? And can it really be that difficult to fix if the functions are in a free Microsoft-program?

Just finaly another question. The sort by-function words kind of weird on the iPod. If you for example under artist write Daughtry/Slash, but chooses to sort by Daughtry, then on the iPod there are all of sudden three artists. Daughtry, Daughtry/Slash and Daughtry again. But none of the two Daughtry options holds the song with Daughtry/Slash. All very weird to me.

There NEEDS to be an '&' delimiting built into itunes for genres and artists ... this much is certain.

To itunes credit, the smartlists are GREAT... unfortunately they cannot be used by most third party systems such as Control4 or media servers.

Also I like the fact that my "soundtracks" smartlist can be orgranized by Album instead of artist... This is a huge help that other media playback software do NOT do.

I really do think Itunes has LOT going for it but could learn a few things from J Rivers Media Center in terms of Artist and Genre listing.

On a side note, APPLE TV would be a decent media server for the home given that it has playlists but it needs to be Rs-232 or IP controllable so that home automation gear such as CONTROL4 can easily get acces to smartlists, transport controls, etc. I DO NOT WANT TO TURN MY TV ON TO LISTEN TO MUSIC... duh.

i hate everytime type 'yo yo ma' to make my itunes sort yo yo ma and other collaborative artist. i simply love click browser. to sort it automatically.

I've submitted this request many times over the past few years. I find it kinda sad that Apple hasn't figured this one out. The one simple feature would bring so much more functionality to iTunes.

This has been my number one feature request for years and actually held me back from getting an ipod as windows media player functionality is lightyears ahead. in wmp you can browse 'contributing artists' which shows a list of all arists in the artist field with multiple artists seperated by semi colon.

Once you have experienced the amazing usability of being able to click on say 'Elton John' and see a list of songs which are labelled as being only by 'Elton John' as well as any other song which includes 'Elton John' for example 'Elton John; Eminem' and then being able to look at 'Eminem' and also see tracks by 'Elton John; Eminem'

The same applies to genres which should work more like a tag system. Seeing 'Vocal' under the genres list and being able to see all tracks which have 'Vocal' in the genre field regardless if they also have other tags in the genre field is a hugely useful feature.

Anyone who has got used to this feature finds it almost impossible to live without. How long before itunes catches up with nearly every other popular media player?

So perhaps my reading comprehension skills are lacking, or I'm just confused about exactly what is being requested (I suspect it's the former). I'm super OCD about my music tags and organizations. I find it difficult to sort single tracks in iTunes, and wish there was just a check-off box to mark something as a single and have it in it's own section or list.

I don't really have a problem with multiple genres or artists, though, and smart playlists solve most of my sorting issues. If I have an album with multiple artists, I just mark it as a compilation and then each track shows the name of the track and underneathe it shows all the artists on that track. I have a smart playlist created for compilations and soundtracks.

When I'm entering genres in album or song info, I just seperate the genres by commas. For example I consider Stevie Wonder (personally) to be soul, funk. If I list them both, I can then make a smart playlist that contains "funk" and "hip-hop" for example and it will include Stevie Wonder in this playlist as well as my hip hop tracks. You could even go as far as to selectively add slightly different genres within a Stevie Wonder album, etc.

I know that with electronic and rap music, etc, there are tons of sub-genres, but why not just write those in commas and then make a smart playlist choosing which genres you want to include? Is this not the functionality that is being requested? Or is it that you want there to be checkboxes for various genres? I actually find that typing in whatever I want leads to basically unlimited sorting potential via smart playlists.

If I was a DJ, I would just add my own tags in comments or genre (ie upbeat, kids, indie, dance party, whatever) and then make a smart playlist to include whatever tags that are appropriate for the audience of the night, then reorder accordingly...

Since I'm more than a little OCD, it actually drives me crazy when tracks show up in multiple places. This happens to me sometimes when I have a soundtrack with a song that is also on an album from the same artist, and if I sort by artist I see the song twice.

I'm assuming that I am misunderstanding the feature that is being requested, because I'm all for more iTunes functionality and think there's a lot of things frustrating about iTunes, but as long as you're using smart playlists it seems like it would be quite easy to make playlists with specific artists, genres, or tags.

Edited to add: didn't mean to one specific person, but the thread in general :)

While using commas in the genre field in conjunction with smart playlists works, they are work arounds for the lack of a native multiple genre tagging function. Working with my tracks should be easy, not more work by creating a slew of smart playlists to filter them out.

So I guess what this is about is the "Genre" tab in iTunes being filled with a ton of random genre types if you seperate things by commas? I get this, and that is annoying. I just ignore my genre tab completely since it's pointless and always has been. It would be nice if the genre tab would automatically recognize that genres seperated by commas should be included within each other (for example if an album/song is tagged as (Hip-hop, Funk) it should show up in both the Hip-hop and Funk genres and not in a new "Hip-hop, Funk" genre.

If this is what people are talking about, I agree that this would be better than the current genre tab. Right now my genres tab is totally pointless and filled with a zillion random different genres.

I do think that even if this functionality was added, I would still use smart playlists rather than genres. It's rare I only want to listen to one specific genre, rather I want to listen to a combination of genres that fit a general mood. Nawmean? Do away with my genre tab IMO, seems like smart playlists are a far better way of sorting your music and creating custom playlists.

Edit: In my case, if multiple genres were enabled in the way being discussed, I would end up with so many albums and songs being in more than one place, which would drive me a bit crazy.