My customized genres get changed back to the iTunes default genre

Here's how to fix it.

1. Make sure the album is downloaded on your computer and that the genre is what you want it to be. You can do this by right clicking on the album and choosing "Get Info". Scroll down to "Genre" and type in the genre you want the album have.

2. Turn off "automatically transfer purchases" in iTunes preferences.

3. Delete album off your phone. Delete it don't just remove downloads.

4. Sync phone with iTunes.

5. Right click on album on your computer in iTunes, and choose "Add to Device" to put the album back on your phone.

6. All the songs will download back onto your phone with the correct genre.

7. If this doesn't work go back to "Get Info" and if the genre says "Mixed", type in the correct genre again and sync phone.

I have exactly the same issue.. and it is really getting to me! I have set these up so I make different selection to play around themes and every morning I go in and (for instance) the 'Rock" default had a whole load of random tracks (not even whole albums) in it??? I re-sort and it happens again the next morning with a different tracks? I assuming iTunes don't really like you customising against their decision making process?!?!?!?

I am having the exact same issue and it looks like it's been going around for more than a year now, without any fix. I have a HUGE library, of both purchased iTunes songs and uploads from CD's and I prefer specific genres and playlists for easier reference. I get it straight and sync my iPod Classic and all looks good. But then a day or two later, say if I want to add something new, lo and behold, iTunes has gone in and apparently randomly changed genres (and sometimes artists' names, album names) to whatever IT feels like. I could almost live with that, having lost count of the number of times I have patiently gone in and changed them back again, but it's even gone so far as to pull songs from within an album and mark them with different genres. I noticed this particularly on film soundtracks, when I saw that the album listing was incomplete in my SOUNDTRACK playlist. Suddenly out of nowhere random songs are listed as Pop, or maybe Rock or Children's Music, but not the whole album, just something here and there, with no explanation. Like everyone who has complained, I am heartily sick of it. We pay for this music and it's in our libraries. How does iTunes justify going in and screwing up our organizational preferences? How do we stop it?!?!?!

I wanted to add that, like others have noted, you CAN change the genres back individually, but it takes time and a lot of patience, and then of course it doesn't stick. If I lick on the INFO tab of any particular song and it opens up, it shows me how I had it. But when I sync my iPod, it's going over the way iTunes has dummied it up and that messes up all of my playlists which I have carefully cultivated over years of iTunes use. So the sync is OUT OF SYNC and how.

I have 2 iPod Classics right now and when I tried to fix this problem (again) just now, it sent the wrong genres over to the iPod I synced. My other one is still correct, but it can't be synced to add new music without messing up the playlists as well.

Does anyone know of a way to have the sync work in reverse? In other words, is there a way to sync my CORRECT iPod Classic back to iTunes and have it overwrite the iTunes library on the laptop? That way at least I could fix it temporarily. Someone suggested restoring an older library, but I just checked and my last backup library is 2 months old, and I cannot guarantee that it was right either, as this problem has been going on for months.

thanks for letting a very disgruntled user vent a bit. So glad to know others are having the same problem - I thought it was just me! 😀

Last week I spent three days with three Apple helpline staff. I noticed that when Match finished an update it reinstated deleted genres. When I looked at these again a number of albums, tracks and PDFs were re-genreised not even to their original iTunes one. When I opened some of then they still had the customised genre but were sorted into a different batch.

Apple didn't really explain it but thought there may be some corrupt something or others in the Match or iTunes library files? We ended up creating a new iTunes folder and library (and having to download everything again). So far I haven't had a reoccurrence of the problem, two weeks in.

I asked Apple if they were aware that there was a lot of blogging about this and they just said yes but didn't really pick up the fact they may need to do something about it. Hope that helps?!?!?!?

GAHHHH! I just spent HOURS last night fixing everything back (AGAIN) and

then syncing both my iPod Classics. I just opened iTunes and it's all back

again!!!!!​

On Tue, Jul 22, 2014 at 4:27 AM, Apple Support Communities Updates <

I know the feeling ! Sometimes I hate Apple products...

I share your pain guys. I had / have the same problem with movies bought from the store. I'm not really bothered about music genres as I view my music in Album format and just listen to playlists on my phone on the train 95% of the time, plus 99% of my music is the same old thumpy house music, so there's no doubting what genre it is 😁

Anyway, a fix I found for the movie genres going back to store default is a rather ridiculous one. It involves dragging a copy of the movie out of itunes, opening it in a free app called "Subler", re-adding the metadata (cover art, descriptions, genres etc), deleting the version that's still in itunes, then copying the edited version back in again. Fixed! You don't have to type it all in manually or search for the cover art. Subler does that for you with a neat little search utility.

It's nuts I know, but it works.

I can't 100% promise it will work with music genres but I'm pretty sure it would.

I can only guess Apple hardcode the genre into the music / movie / TV Show and it can only be changed when iTunes *thinks* it's a new movie that's been dragged in. Why a dragged in file should be treated any differently to a downloaded one is anyone's guess, but this issue certainly only came about in version 11 onwards as far as I can tell. Seems to be the way these days. They rush out new versions with new shiney bits but break something that used to work fautlessly. What kind of testing do they do at Apple, if any at all?

P.S. I did this process a month ago and the genres have stuck to what I set them to.

P.P.S I've never had any issues with CDs or DVDs, BluRays etc imported into iTunes pre version 11. The genres have all stuck.

My tags in the Grouping field for songs are all gone. I label songs here as Favorite or another playlist name. Spent several hours doing this. Now the Grouping field is blank.

I am having precisely the same problem as the original poster and it seems to me that it started when I signed up for iTunes Match. Even though I've turned that service off on both my MacBook Pro and my iPhone, this problem continues. I was thinking it had something to do with music that had been "upgraded" by iTunes Match. Has anyone experienced this problem despite NOT ever having purchased iTunes Match? This, at least, would clear up whether it's isolated to current/former iTunes Match users.

It only occurs with a small subset of my music ... maybe 30%. So something unique must have occurred with these songs. Perhaps they were "upgraded" by iTunes Match and are forever connected to the iTunes servers?

Go to iTunes > Preferences > Store and turn off

• Show iTunes in the Cloud purchases
• Share details about your library with Apple

On any iOS device go to Settings > Music and turn off

Show All Music

Close and reopen iTunes and/or reset the device and you should see your version of the metadata for each track rather than the original store data.

(Not sure if this also works if iTunes match is in use since I don't use it.)

tt2

Nope. Didn't fix it. I have even restored my entire music library from my iPod onto a NEW hard drive, reinstalled iTunes, everything. It's SLIGHTLY better now - only what I have downloaded from iTunes since then reverts for the most part. I did find a bit of a workaround but it's not great. I have changed the GROUPINGS to what I want in the playlist, so that even if the GENRE changes/reverts, the playlists are looking at GROUPINGS instead. IOS8 didn't help matters much, either - was so hoping that they would fix the problem with the new release. GRRRRRRR...

GRRRRRR indeed. iTunes should never mess with the user's metadata. 😮

tt2

I just spent HOURS last night fixing everything back (AGAIN) and

then syncing both my iPod Classics. I just opened iTunes and it's all back

again!!!!!​

For me the changing back happens, when I confirm the prompt "There are purchased items on your device that are not in your iTunes library - do you want to download them"? If I allow the download, the previous versions of the songs with the wrong genre and title will be synced back, and I have to edit the songs again. The problem is, that this prompt never gives any information on which items will be synced back.

It is one infinite loop.

Already had iTunes preferences set the way you described, but changing my iPhone SETTINGS | MUSIC option got rid of the reset iTunes default genres. Could be that it was simply showing cloud music that wasn't on my iPhone at all, and as a result was showing me the only genre it knew of. Not sure. Regardless, it fixed the issue for me.

It seems that when those options are enabled iTunes/iOS can download the store metadata before processing what is in your library and even when you have a local copy of the item you get shown the store version's data. Fully disabling those options makes your own changes show.

tt2