Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[nguyenkhoang]

I'm in the process of updating (again) the tags on my large music collection, and have decided to clean up my genre. I had made the initial mistake of using too many genres, which made it hard for my girlfriend to find music (and for me, when I forget what genre i had put it in).

I then decided to consolidate some genres, and create subgenres instead.  Then I started to create too many subgenres, and now I begin to repeat my previous toubles with genres.

Does anyone here have a "simple" one they use and can share with me?

I'd like to do something like:
1. Pop/Rock
1a. Oldies (e.g., Beach Boys, Elvis Presley, Carpenters)
1b. Vocals (Celine Dion, Babs Streisand, Josh Groban)
1c. Rock (Guns N Roses, Poison, etc.)
1d. R&B (Luthor Vandross, etc.)
1e. Generic Pop (Debbie Gibson, Sting, etc.)
1f. Alternative/Fusion (uh...this is where I put Enigma)

2. Country
No need for categorization here...my country collection consists of Kenny Rogers, Shania Twain and Faith Hill  .

3. Easy Listening
The subgenres for this was a bear...this Genre I put Enya, Kenny G, Richard Clayderman (Piano), John Tesh (dunno...new agish piano music), Saxophone stuff...help.

4. Jazz
No need to categorize for me here...my jazz is limited to Miles Davis .

5. Classical
This is a tough one. I started doing:
Symphony
Concertos
Sonatas
Mazurkas
Waltzs
String Quartet
...

It got crazy.  I still couldn't find what I wanted...maybe I should have done:
Symphony (e.g., Beethoven's 5th)
Orchestral (e.g., Bach's suites)
Strings (e.g., String quartets and violin/string pieces)
Piano (Debussy, Chopin, Liszt pieces)
Ensemble (smaller than orchestral pieces, maybe string and piano, flute and string...must an ensemble be more than 2 pieces?)
Guitar (for guitars, obviously...or does this belong under strings)
Woodwind (dunno...don't know any pieces just for woodwind)
Brass (dunno...there any pieces just for brass)
Organ (Bach's organ pieces)

Anyone else have a well organized Classical genre-subgenre they can share with me?

[pipsqueak]

the problem here is thats its such a personal issue...

I have 20+ categories for electronic music (theres no way nuNRG and goa trance could every share a genre) and 2 for rock (rock and classic rock)...some riends have the opposite (space rock, prog rock, pop rock, synth rock) ...say what?

if you find someone with *similar* tastes then check out their categories, but if not i'd steer clear as they willdoubtless be either under or overly complex

pip

[Chris Shaw]

I'm in the process of updating (again) the tags on my large music collection, and have decided to clean up my genre. I had made the initial mistake of using too many genres, which made it hard for my girlfriend to find music (and for me, when I forget what genre i had put it in).

This sounds like you should add some more view schemes. I generally only use my Genre view scheme if I want e.g. a random selection of mellow tunes. If I want a specific track, I use the artist/album view scheme. Sounds like your organisation scheme is working against you.

[groovedaddy]

It got crazy.  I still couldn't find what I wanted

First ask, "Why do I really want to organize by genre? What am I hoping to get out of this?" As most here will point out, genre/subgenre is subjective so find a solution that works for you. The answers might help you figure out the best strategy for developing a cataloging scheme.

A suggestion is to check out allmusic.com and its companion site, allclassical.com. I've used them to help me drill down into my own library. In particular, look at styles and tones on each artist's page. I've used those keywords to help me develop smartlists for subgenres like emo, punk, etc. that all could fall under rock as a major genre.

@l@n has created a cool plugin that is extremely helpful when tagging large collections:
http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?board=5;action=display;threadid=20970

Good luck,
GDaddy