Can Track-Artist or Track-Composer be used in file/folder naming formulas?

[haggis999]

The Metadata window in dBpoweramp CD Ripper appears to provide a facility to specify three different artist lists; one for the album as a whole (called Album Artist), another one for the album as a whole (called Artist) and yet another for each specific track (name unknown). Similarly, there is a Composer tag that applies at album level and another tag (name unknown) for the composer relevant for each specific track. However, the elements listed for use in naming formulas only include Artist, Album Artist and Composer.

Is it possible to make references to the track-specific artist and composer tags in a naming formula?

David

[garym]

Re: Can Track-Artist or Track-Composer be used in file/folder naming formulas?

I'm a bit confused. Album Artist is for when the Album has an overall artist, but individual tracks may have differing artists (common with compilation CDs for example). My interpretation is that ARTIST and COMPOSER apply at the track level and ALBUM ARTIS applies at the album level. Of course in the ripper screen (or later in editing metadata) one can put the same thing in all the ARTIST of COMPOSER fields of an album, then the ARTIST or COMPOSER will show up for each of these tracks.

Tell us what sort of naming convention you are trying to get with this info. Specific examples always help.

[haggis999]

Re: Can Track-Artist or Track-Composer be used in file/folder naming formulas?

Hi Gary,
It's me that has been confused by the layout of the 'Review Metadata' window in dBpoweramp CD Ripper. This lets me enter 'Beethoven' in the Composer drop-down box in the top left corner of the screen and an entirely different composer's name for each track. I therefore assumed that Beethoven, in this case, was an album-level tag. However, I have just run a test using such mixed composer choices. On returning to the main Ripper window I found that Composer was now listed as <Various Composers>. You are therefore correct in your assumption that Composer is only a track level tag.

However, another test showed that things were not the same for the tag called Artist. This does appear to be an album level tag. If I include Artist in a naming formula, all tracks get the same value (as displayed at the top of the Review Metadata screen). There does not appear to be a way to reference the 'Track-Artist' in a formula.

David

[garym]

Re: Can Track-Artist or Track-Composer be used in file/folder naming formulas?

Hi Gary,
It's me that has been confused by the layout of the 'Review Metadata' window in dBpoweramp CD Ripper. This lets me enter 'Beethoven' in the Composer drop-down box in the top left corner of the screen and an entirely different composer's name for each track. I therefore assumed that Beethoven, in this case, was an album-level tag. However, I have just run a test using such mixed composer choices. On returning to the main Ripper window I found that Composer was now listed as <Various Composers>. You are therefore correct in your assumption that Composer is only a track level tag.

However, another test showed that things were not the same for the tag called Artist. This does appear to be an album level tag. If I include Artist in a naming formula, all tracks get the same value (as displayed at the top of the Review Metadata screen). There does not appear to be a way to reference the 'Track-Artist' in a formula.

David

There is not really a such animal as "track artist". If you enter "artist" in the ripping screen and do NOT have the COMPILATIONS box ticked, then ARTIST will automatically apply to every track. But if you tick the COMPILATIONS box, you'll see how you can enter a different ARTIST for each track (yet have a single ALBUM ARTIST for the complete album). You may want to explore some addtional tags (soloists, etc.) for your classical music.

[haggis999]

Re: Can Track-Artist or Track-Composer be used in file/folder naming formulas?

The penny is slowly starting to drop! Once again, it is the layout of the Review Metadata window that has been the source of my confusion. It explicitly refers to 'Artists', 'Album Artists' and 'Track-Artists'.

Thanks, as always, for your very helpful advice.

David

[garym]

Re: Can Track-Artist or Track-Composer be used in file/folder naming formulas?

The penny is slowly starting to drop! Once again, it is the layout of the Review Metadata window that has been the source of my confusion. It explicitly refers to 'Artists', 'Album Artists' and 'Track-Artists'.

Thanks, as always, for your very helpful advice.

David

hmmm, where do you see anything labeled "track-Artists"? When I look at Review Meta I see Artist, Album, Album Artist, Genre, Year, Disc, Composer etc. The only thing I see that shows "track-artists" is the box one can tick to "view track-artists". All this is doing is showing you the ARTIST track and COMPOSER track separately for each track in the album (thus the use of the term "track-artist". But ARTIST and COMPOSER is still a track specific metadata field and there is no such metadata field as "track-artist". Yes, I know this is all confusing, but it eventually makes sense! ;-)

p.s. And do note that one can have multiple ARTISTfields on a single track. For example, in a single FLAC track, I could have 2 ARTIST fields. One can say "Willie Nelson" and the second can say "Wynton Marsalis" (i.e., a CD where they are both on each track. One does this in the ripper screen by putting a ";" between the two artists names. Then such track will show up under a search for Willie Nelson or a search for Wynton Marsalis (or browsing for either artist in an artist listing, etc.). edit: and this should work for COMPOSER too (multiple COMPOSER fields in a single track)

[haggis999]

Re: Can Track-Artist or Track-Composer be used in file/folder naming formulas?

hmmm, where do you see anything labeled "track-Artists"? ........ The only thing I see that shows "track-artists" is the box one can tick to "view track-artists".

You answered your own question!

It is all beginning to make more sense to me. My naming conventions for a variety of scenarios are now nearing completion, though I will probably hit another rock or two along the way...

David

[haggis999]

Re: Can Track-Artist or Track-Composer be used in file/folder naming formulas?

I have just realised that as all tags are specific to a given FLAC file, this means that ALL tags are track-specific and there is not really any such thing as an album-level tag. The CD Ripper interface may force all tracks to use the same value for the Album, Album Artist and Genre tags, etc, but these could be changed afterwards by a tag editor to be track-specific.

David

[garym]

Re: Can Track-Artist or Track-Composer be used in file/folder naming formulas?

I have just realised that as all tags are specific to a given FLAC file, this means that ALL tags are track-specific and there is not really any such thing as an album-level tag. The CD Ripper interface may force all tracks to use the same value for the Album, Album Artist and Genre tags, etc, but these could be changed afterwards by a tag editor to be track-specific.

David

correct. And that would have been an easier way to explain things earlier instead of the approach I took. Be a bit careful, some (most) players keep track of things based on tags. And they expect to see every track on an album have the same album name or album artist name, etc. So if you gave different tracks different album names, don't be surprised if you player treats these as different albums (even if all the tracks are in the same "physical" album folder.

[haggis999]

Re: Can Track-Artist or Track-Composer be used in file/folder naming formulas?

So if you gave different tracks different album names, don't be surprised if you player treats these as different albums (even if all the tracks are in the same "physical" album folder.

Actually, I think that is the behaviour I would expect from any player. Don't most players just ignore the filename and folder unless you specifically ask them to browse the hard disk structure?

However, this is probably just an academic point, as my current thoughts are to retain the real album structure in the metadata and use searches to flush out music buried inside an album mainly devoted to another major work.

David

[garym]

Re: Can Track-Artist or Track-Composer be used in file/folder naming formulas?

Actually, I think that is the behaviour I would expect from any player. Don't most players just ignore the filename and folder unless you specifically ask them to browse the hard disk structure?

However, this is probably just an academic point, as my current thoughts are to retain the real album structure in the metadata and use searches to flush out music buried inside an album mainly devoted to another major work.

David

yes most (all good ones) rely on metadata and not folder structure. Yes, you need to explore the use of your own custom tags as this may help too. But then it somewhat depends on the ability of the player program to use those tags. Squeezebox system has good use of custom tags, custom browsing plugins, etc. Particularly useful for classical music collections.