Multiple Artist Entries for Same Album

I have the same problem on my library. Some artists are duplicated 3 times.
The only solutions that worked for me is to reimport these files.

I think it's a bug that should be fixed in a future release.

Did you check the Sort Artist field? In the Get Info window, click the Sorting tab, and see if you have tracks with the same Artist Sort field and different Artist field. If you do, the iPod sorts by Sort Artist, but doesn't know how to sort beyond that, so you get various Artists jumbled up.

You may be able to fix your problem by making the Artist Sort field unique for each unique Artist.

Thanks for your answer but it didn't work for me.

In the 3 column view (button "Quickly browse my iTunes Library"), in the middle one, some artists have multiple entries and they refer to the same albums, same songs and same files.

I noticed it only happen with artists who also have duets.

All my tracks are tagged really carefully and I didn't have this issue on the previous version of iTunes.

Don't know what to say, then. I had exactly the same problem, but it was caused by having the same Sort Artist field for different Artist fields. Are the Sort Artist fields blank for all these tracks? (You can check that by control-clicking your column headers and checking Sort Artist to show that column.) You might be able to fix it by manually copying the different Artist fields into the Sort Artist fields for those tracks, thereby ensuring that they're sorted differently.

You want to be dealing with Sort Artist, not Sort Album Artist. Album Artist and Sort Album Artist don't affect iPod sorting, as far as I can tell; don't bother with them right now.

So, step by step: say you have an album with some tracks by "Johnny Cash" and some by "Johnny Cash with June Carter". The Sort Artist fields are blank for all tracks. In the Sorting tab of the Get Info window, copy "Johnny Cash" into the Sort Artist field of all the Johnny Cash tracks, then copy "Johnny Cash with June Carter" into the Sort Artist field of the duets.

You can save some time by entering the Sort Artist field once for each artist (one "Johnny Cash" and one "Johnny Cash with June Carter"), then control-clicking each track and selecting Apply Sort Field > Same Artist ( not Same Album Artist!). Make sure the Sort Artist column is visible in your library window, so you can make sure the Artist and Sort Artist are the same.

I do not understand the purpose of having the same entry for the Artist and the Sort Artist fields. Tell me if I'm wrong but iTunes can already sort your library using the Artist field only. No need for a new field with the exact same info.

In my library, multiple entries are caused by what you said in your last post. For instance for a song with 1 artist (let's say John Legend for instance), I decided to let the Sort Artist field blank, but if for the same artist I have 2 duets in the same album (John Legend feat. Snoop Dogg and John Legend feat. Kanye West), then in the Sort Artist field I will only enter the first artist (John Legend) so that the song won't appear in a separate albums.

In that case, I'm going to have 2 entries for John Legend in the browse library view (and so in my iPod). I'll have the duets entries too.

I don't know if I'm clear, it's not easy to explain.

I do not understand the purpose of having the same
entry for the Artist and the Sort Artist fields. Tell
me if I'm wrong but iTunes can already sort your
library using the Artist field only. No need for a
new field with the exact same info.

The Sort Artist field forces iTunes and the iPod to sort by that field. Since your iPod is clearly not sorting properly by the Artist field, copying unique entries into the Sort Artist field may do the trick. I can't be sure if it will, but why not try it and see if it works? It should only take a few minutes to try it for one album.

In my library, multiple entries are caused by what
you said in your last post. For instance for a song
with 1 artist (let's say John Legend for instance), I
decided to let the Sort Artist field blank, but if
for the same artist I have 2 duets in the same album
(John Legend feat. Snoop Dogg and John Legend feat.
Kanye West), then in the Sort Artist field I will
only enter the first artist (John Legend) so that the
song won't appear in a separate albums.

Yup. That is exactly what causes the duplication. It's like buying a bunch of apples and cherries and labeling them "red fruit", then telling someone to sort by that label — you'll get all your red fruit together, but the apples and cherries will be jumbled up, since there's nothing to sort by within the "red fruit" category. You're telling the iPod to sort all of your John Legend tracks together, regardless of whether there are other artists or not, so of course they'll end up being jumbled. By entering the same Sort Artist field for "John Legend" and "John Legend feat. Kanye West", you're essentially telling the iPod, "There's no difference between these two artists — throw them in the same bin." The iPod then looks to the track numbers, so you'll end up with duplicated solo tracks sandwiched between duets.

I certainly agree it would be better if iTunes sorted first by Sort Artist and then by Artist, and I hope that'll appear in the next upgrade. But right now you have to fix it by having unique Sort Artist fields for each unique Artist.

This will not make the songs "appear in a separate album" — they'll still all be grouped together by album when sorting by album.

In that case, I'm going to have 2 entries for John
Legend in the browse library view (and so in my
iPod). I'll have the duets entries too.

Yes. The solution is to copy the full Artist fields (with the duet artists) into the Sort Artist fields, so the iPod knows to group them separately when sorting by Artist. This won't cause them to appear as two separate albums when sorting by album (at least, it doesn't for me) — the album will be sorted by the Sort Artist of the first track.

Let's see if I can explain this a little more clearly. Let's say I have a seven-track album with the following Artist fields (and blank Sort Artist fields):

1. A
2. A
3. A & B
4. A
5. A & C
6. A
7. A

Right now, my iPod will sort them by Artist, since the Sort Artist fields are blank. Assuming nothing weird is happening with compilations, I'll open my Artist list in iTunes and see

A
A & B
A & C

Now, let's say I copy "A" into the Sort Artist fields of every duet. Then, my iPod will see the following sorting information:

1. A
2. A
3. A
4. A
5. A
6. A
7. A

It'll say, "OK, those are all the same artist, so I can file them all in the 'A' bin. Now, I'll sort them by track number." And my Artist list will look like this:

A
A & B
A
A & C
A

You see?

First, I'd like to thank you for your help, I really appreciate. I understood exactly what you said but iTunes behavior with that sort thing doesn't sound very logical to me. What is the purpose of having a bunch of new sort fields if they're meant to contain the exact same info as alreary entered?

Let me explain what I'd like and tell me what you think. I use the cover flow view a lot and I don't like it's behavior with albums. If in the same album I have an artist "A" and a duet "A+B", they are going to appear separately, so I'll have the same cover twice for the same album. By forcing the "A+B" song to appear as an "A" song with the Sort Artist field, it fixes the problem but creates in the same time multiples "A" entries in my artists list.

What can I do ?

First, I'd like to thank you for your help, I really
appreciate. I understood exactly what you said but
iTunes behavior with that sort thing doesn't sound
very logical to me. What is the purpose of having a
bunch of new sort fields if they're meant to contain
the exact same info as alreary entered?

Glad to help! 🙂 It should work fine if all of the Sort Artist fields are blank, too; I just suggested copying the data because I thought you were having trouble when they were already all blank. The problem arises for you, I think, because some of your Sort Artist fields are blank and some aren't — you're attempting to give tracks with different Artists the same Sort Artist.

Let me explain what I'd like and tell me what you
think. I use the cover flow view a lot and I don't
like it's behavior with albums. If in the same album
I have an artist "A" and a duet "A+B", they are going
to appear separately, so I'll have the same cover
twice for the same album. By forcing the "A+B" song
to appear as an "A" song with the Sort Artist field,
it fixes the problem but creates in the same time
multiples "A" entries in my artists list.

What can I do ?

I do exactly the same thing, but it works fine for me. I'm not sure what we're doing differently. Here's how I do it:

I keep my library sorted "Album by Year", which sorts first by Artist, then chronologically, then by Album. Is it possible you're not sorting on the Album (or Album by Artist/Album by Year) column? Sorting by Artist would generate the multiple-Cover Flow behavior you're seeing — if you want to keep albums together, you'll need to sort on the album column (for obvious reasons!).

Cover Flow is really designed to be used with the Album column, as if you were flipping through your record collection; sorting on other columns won't be as pretty. (Sorting by song name, for instance, will give you one cover for each song in your library. Sorting by Artist will, I think, give you one cover for each unique Artist.)

For a CD with more than one Artist field, I make sure the Sort Artist fields are different for each unique Artist. Then, if a (non-compilation) album has multiple Artists on it, it's alphabetized under the Sort Artist field of the first track when sorted Album by Artist. (If the Sort Artist field is blank, it sorts by the Artist field, so leaving them all blank works just as well as filling in the Sort Artist fields.)

Finally, I ended up clearing the Sort Artist field for all my tracks because iTunes was generating a new artist for each duet.

In the cover flow mode, I'll use the Sort Album by Artist column to avoid multiple covers for the same album.

I have to add that I still don't understand the real purpose of the new sorting options...

Again, thank you for your help!

The sorting fields work great if you want things to alphabetize differently — if you want your artists to be sorted "last name, first name" you can put that in the Sort Artist fields and not touch the Artist fields. For instance, you can choose whether you want "Blind Lemon" Jefferson sorted under B or J — instead of the default behavior of alphabetizing under "!

It's also good for things like dropping "A" and "An" from the beginning of albums and songs and artists for purposes of alphabetization, making sure "100,000 Fireflies" comes after "1000 Miles Per Hour", etc. It grants you new customization options. It works perfectly, in fact, in all cases except when dissimilar items share a Sort field, because then iTunes loses track of how to sort them.

Apple could fix this by sorting first by Sort Artist, and then secondarily by Artist (if it differs). That'd make me happy.