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You are here: MacNN Forums > Hardware - Troubleshooting and Discussion > iPhone, iPad & iPod > iPhone/iTunes - can I organize music MY way?

iPhone/iTunes - can I organize music MY way?
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Simon
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Sep 10, 2009, 08:26 AM
 
I know iTunes/iPhone offer very sophisticated ways of organizing music, but despite trying to work with it the way it's intended for several years now, I simply can't get it to work in a way I feel comfortable with.

I have a very old-fashioned way of thinking about my music. In my head it's organized as a big CD case. I have a section with hundreds of CD albums. Next to it I have a collection of singles that I have either ripped from somewhere or I have bought from the iTS. That's the way I want it to be organized in iTunes.

I would now like to sort my music into two basic groups. Music I have as an album and singles. For albums I would further like to organize along the lines classical, jazz, and modern. I'd group singles in maybe five to eight categories.

Now when browsing/listeing with iTunes or my iPhone I'd like to either view albums or singles and then dive in to one of the sub-categories. In a sub-category I want to see items only once, i.e. music I have on an album doesn't pop up in the singles section and singles don't appear in the album section (as albums of which I won only one song). If I'm in the album section I want to browse by album, if I'm in the single section I want to browse by song.

Is there any way to use iTunes and the iPhone like that?
     
Spheric Harlot
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Sep 10, 2009, 08:31 AM
 
There's a script over at dougscripts.com that will create a playlist of everything where you only have one song from an album (which would apply to singles, I suppose).

You could get the rest sorted by smart playlist criterion "Playlist is not 'Singles'".

(Aside: If it's possible to do that for single tracks, it has to be possible to do so for two or three tracks as well, right? Does anybody know how easy it is to script this? I really have no clue...)
     
ort888
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Sep 10, 2009, 06:14 PM
 
You can a whole lot with a combination of the comments field, genres and smart playlists.

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Simon  (op)
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Sep 11, 2009, 03:20 AM
 
I don't mind separating albums and singles by hand (maybe I'd even prefer that), the question I think is much more if I can also view and listen to music in that way. Is there a way to get iTunes and the iPhone to respect the fact that singles and album tracks should not be mixed?
     
Simon  (op)
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Dec 18, 2009, 04:41 AM
 
Umm, bump?
     
anthology123
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Dec 18, 2009, 01:21 PM
 
ort is right, you can do exactly the kind of sorting that you want depending on how detailed you make the info on each MP3 track. Using fields of Artist, Title, album title, Genre, notes/comments, year, etc, and then use playlists and smart playlists in combination with those info fields. If you want iTunes or the iPhone to determine whether a song is an album version or a single/45 version, then you should indicate that in the title of the song, too, and it can sort that too, write a bit after the title that's like- <song title> (single version).
     
Simon  (op)
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Dec 18, 2009, 01:33 PM
 
Hmm, maybe I'm just not getting it. I don't see how this will prevent singles from showing up when I sort by album in iTunes or when I browse by album on my iPhone. But that's exactly what I want to do. Since that's the way I'd listen to my music if I'd get it off CDs.

My problem isn't creating a playlist with my singles. I can do that by hand. My problem is stopping single tracks from being mixed with album tracks.
     
The Final Dakar
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Dec 18, 2009, 01:37 PM
 
I think the only way you could accomplish that would be to brand all your singles as such in the Grouping field, create a playlist that excludes anything labeled such, and browse your music via that playlist.

Edit: My reading skills are weak, Spheric already suggested this.
( Last edited by The Final Dakar; Dec 18, 2009 at 01:43 PM. )
     
anthology123
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Dec 18, 2009, 01:47 PM
 
If you are sorting by album, and the singles appear in the list (main list, not a playlist) then why don't you put as album title for the singles something like "Single version" so it sorts them away from the group of albums.
Of if you want them to be adjacent to the albums but not within the album you could put it as
"album name - singles version" and it will list them right after the album versions.
     
Simon  (op)
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Dec 18, 2009, 02:01 PM
 
I guess that would give some separation. I was hoping I wouldn't have to change metainfo though. It's not that I don't want to 'know' which album a single belongs too. I just don't like the idea of Kiss' Burn Bitch Burn being being listed anywhere near my Beethoven Serenades.
     
B Gallagher
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Jan 9, 2010, 06:25 PM
 
Originally Posted by The Final Dakar View Post
I think the only way you could accomplish that would be to brand all your singles as such in the Grouping field, create a playlist that excludes anything labeled such, and browse your music via that playlist.

Edit: My reading skills are weak, Spheric already suggested this.
That's what I've done, and it works quite well for me. I just went in manually and for anything which is an album, I put "Album" in the Grouping tag. Then I just made a smart playlist which only shows songs tagged as such, so I have all the albums in my iTunes library in one playlist.

It's not ideal - I would prefer if there was room, either in the ID3 tag or the iTunes database to specify LP/EP/Single, etc. But it works fine for what I need it to do.
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ghporter
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Jan 9, 2010, 06:44 PM
 
I've assigned my singles different "album titles" to reflect things like their genre or relevance. I see that as using the built-in features of iTunes to make it do what I want.

Glenn -----OTR/L, MOT, Tx
     
   
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