I came to the conclusion some time ago that if one has a large amount of classical music as well as other types on a digital player, whether stand-alone , networked or on a PC, at least two different sources are required. Like JohnB I feel that Classical music needs a totally different structure, and it requires a different approach to ripping or copying from LPs.
For pop/rock/folk/jazz or any of their sub-genres the usual Album-Artist/Album/Track layout is fine, whether for folders and files or for filtering using tags. However, for Classical (say for several hundred albums plus) things need to be quite different. Firstly, I suggest that you must create separate genres (Symphonies/Concertos/Sonatas/Chamber etc - I currently use about 8), and these must be rigidly adhered to. Secondly you must replace the Album with the 'work' or 'piece'; indeed, the 'album' needs to be replaced by the 'work' (i.e. the Album tag should now be the title of the work or piece). Thirdly, the Artist and Album Artist fields (equal) must include the Conductor, Orchestra and soloists where appropriate in a shortish form (e.g. Solti - LSO, Kempf - Leitner - Berlin Phil, Medici String Quartet), and all of the appropriate tags should be filled in, in full, with the Composer field being of primary importance. This then facilitates a basic structure, hopefully reflected in the folder structure, of: Composer -> Genre -> Work (album) -> Artists (album-artists) -> Movement (# + track) e.g. Brahms -> Concertos -> Piano Concerto No 2 -> Ashkenazy - Haitink - Vienna Phil -> 1 - Allegro non Troppo ...................................................................................................................2 - Allegro ... ...................................................................................................................3.. ....................................................................-> Arrau - Haitink - Concertgebouw -> 1 - Allegro non Troppo ....................................................................................................................2 - ... This does entail a bit of extra work to achieve, but in the end it does provide for the sort of structure that is required. I am only using the SbT as a stand-alone player, permanently linked in to my stereo system, and as such I am going to be using a USB memory-stick for pop/rock/folk/jazz and all their sub-divisions, and an SDXC card for the classical. This entails a lengthy switch between the two, but does keep the structures quite separate. I guess you could use more than one drive in a NAS device or mount different folders on a PC as different drives (to the network). Unfortunately, I do not know my way around the library system of the SbT very well, but it does not seem to me to have similar capabilities as Media Monkey does on a PC, with separate libraries with which you can associate filters based on particular tags. I admit though that I need to do more research, especially for the library plug-ins; perhaps someone can tell me if it is possible to mimic the Media Monkey features. Please note also that for just a few dozen classical albums you can probably get away with something much simpler, such as composer, work and artists in the album-artist and/or album tag as suggested above. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ arthurb's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=56956 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=94014 _______________________________________________ ripping mailing list [email protected] http://lists.slimdevices.com/mailman/listinfo/ripping
