I believe the music industry is trying to get their metadata act together, although their specs don’t quite jibe with the library world.



http://musicbiz.org/press-releases/music-biz-music-metadata-style-guide/



Throwing that out there and running like hell. ☺ (…because I haven’t actually reviewed them)



Best,

Sandy



Sandy Rodriguez

Special Collections Metadata Librarian

University of Missouri-Kansas City

410 Miller Nichols Library | 5100 Rockhill Road | Kansas City, MO 64110-2499

Phone: (816) 235-2229 | Fax: (816) 333-5584 | [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>



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-----Original Message-----
From: Association for Recorded Sound Discussion List [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Peter Hirsch
Sent: Monday, November 24, 2014 9:48 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Sound recordings cataloging software



Tom,



Yes, consistency which is maintained by authority control (in

library-speak) is absolutely essential and no decent system can function without it. That is why I prefer to use MARC records created under the cataloging rules generally accepted by libraries. I believe, though, that once I find software that enables me to download these records from Library of Congress, OCLC or wherever, I will still need to tweak them to get the full depth of access to all (recorded work, all individuals involved in performing and recording to whatever degree this is discoverable) information attached to each recorded unit (I hate using the term track, but that is roughly what I mean here) level.



All this discussion has been very useful so far and I hope to explore as many of the avenues mentioned as possible.



Thanks,



Peter Hirsch





On Mon, Nov 24, 2014 at 8:24 PM, Tom Fine <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>>

wrote:



> The downfall of all these database programs is where they're pulling

> information. The more I think about it, the more sense I see in

> Peter's idea of using MARC data. At least MARC aheres to relatively

> strict conventions. They may be klunky, but they're designed to be consistent.

>

> As one who has filled in tags for 150+ classical CDs, trying both

> iTunes

> (Gracenote) and dBPowerAmp (which draws on a number of sources

> including freedb, Allmusic and others), there is ZERO consistency out

> there. The same conductor and orchestra may be listed differently for

> each album, even on the same label. Composer names are screwy and

> sometimes just wrong. A lot of data, especially for DGG and EMI CDs,

> is in German (useless to an English speaker who wants an English

> database). The whole experience was infuriating, and in fact convinced

> me it wasn't worth my time to suck all my CDs into a hard drive

> library. The worst of all this is that Gracenote is a FOR PROFIT

> company and they have never lifted a finger to clean up their database

> from its dark early "crowdsourced" days. You can expect crowd-source

> cluster-you-know-what from freedb, but a real "company" should value

> their brand more. Apparently, customers who pay license fees, like Apple, don't pressure them hard enough.

>

> Even though MARC's naming conventions may not be near what I would

> think of, I assume the same conductor and orchestra show up under the

> same names in every entry. If not, that's terrible!

>

> From Day 1, record companies could have kept all of this consistent

> and

>> uniform by using the CDText

>>

> layer always in Red Book, and getting together on standardized naming

> conventions, perhaps under an ISO standard. This would have required a

> few extra minutes per CD to enter the data, but it should have been

> standard practice all along. Instead, a lazy attitude by everyone who

> could control a standard led to crowd-sourced inconsistent garbage.

>

> -- Tom Fine

>

>

> ----- Original Message ----- From: "L. Hunter Kevil"

> <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>>

> To: <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>>

> Sent: Monday, November 24, 2014 8:00 PM

> Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Sound recordings cataloging software

>

>

> I wonder if anyone has extensive experience with jRiver, media

> library

>> software for digital files. It has received wide praise over the

>> years. It can read and process into libraries CDs. It can handle - I

>> believe - all the sundry audio file formats.

>>

>> I have thousands of lps as well.The question is this: will jRiver

>> handle the cataloguing of lps, even if there is no digital file

>> attached? I harbor the hope - optimistic for sure - of digitizing

>> some of my most cherished lps.

>>

>> L. H. Kevil

>> Out to pasture, Univ of Missouri

>>

>>

>> On Mon, Nov 24, 2014 at 1:14 PM, Stephen <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote:

>>

>> I use Collectorz's Music Collector software for my collection of

>> about

>>> 2800

>>> recordings (CD, vinyl, and digital files), and find it extremely useful.

>>> It's not perfect--it pulls info from sources (Amazon, for example,

>>> or data uploaded to the Collectorz database by other users) that are

>>> not always 100% accurate, so I usually have to do some editing. But

>>> it does allow easy searching of artists, conductors, orchestras,

>>> labels, genres, etc. It allows for recordings with multiple

>>> artists, composers, orchestras, etc.

>>> And you can specify where the recording is stored.

>>>

>>> You can catalog recordings in several ways: 1) Place a CD in your

>>> computer's CD drive, and let the program scan it; 2) Use a barcode

>>> scanner on the back of the CD case; 3) Type in the UPC or title, and

>>> let the program search for matches; 4) Point the program to digital

>>> files on your computer or backup device, and let it scan those; or

>>> 5) Enter info manually.

>>> With

>>> #1-4, covers are downloaded automatically from various sources; with

>>> #5, after adding the recording, you use the program to search for a

>>> cover, which is then downloaded and added to the database. (This

>>> last method can also be used with methods 1-4 to get a different

>>> cover than the one automatically

>>> downloaded.)

>>>

>>> I've been impressed by the constant improvements in the program since I

>>> purchased it several years ago. My only complaint is that there is yet

>>> no

>>> simple search-and-replace that allows you to replace (for example)

>>> "G-Dur"

>>> with "G major".

>>>

>>>

>>> Stephen Peithman, Producer/Host, “Connections”

>>> Capital Public Radio | capradio.org | 7055 Folsom Blvd, Sacramento,

>>> CA

>>> 95826

>>> Listener supported Public Radio | Licensed to Sacramento State

>>>

>>>

>>>

>>>

>>>

>>> -----Original Message-----

>>> From: Association for Recorded Sound Discussion List

>>> [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Marsha Maguire

>>> Sent: Monday, November 24, 2014 9:35 AM

>>> To: [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>

>>> Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Sound recordings cataloging software

>>>

>>> Hi, Peter,

>>>

>>> As discussed earlier, there are some free and inexpensive

>>> applications out there that should allow you to capture existing

>>> MARC or other descriptive metadata and load it into a database. A

>>> good place to start looking for such software is the American

>>> Library Association's Automating Libraries: A Selected Annotated

>>> Bibliography (ALA Library Fact Sheet 21, 2014), available at

>>> http://www.ala.org/tools/libfactsheets/alalibraryfactsheet21. One

>>> product mentioned there (although it doesn't seem to work with MARC

>>> data) is Music Collector at Collectorz.com:

>>> http://www.collectorz.com/music/ I have no idea how complete the

>>> Music Collector database is (from which you can download records

>>> into your home database), but according to one review, Amazon is

>>> also searched. There is an optional barcode reader add-on.

>>>

>>> A similar product is Readerware Music Database, which lets you scan

>>> in the UPC barcode (or enter other info like Title, etc.). It then

>>> "collects full information from a number of different sources

>>> including reviews, cover art, full disk and track listings" for your

>>> home database:

>>> http://www.readerware.com/index.php/products/details/music_details

>>> Both these products offer free trials, and both are very inexpensive.

>>>

>>> Another option is CollectiveAccess, which, although it's intended

>>> primarily for archival and museum collections, can import MARC and

>>> other data (how simple this process is I'm not sure):

>>> http://collectiveaccess.org/. You could download MARC records and

>>> export them in various formats with the wonderful MarcEdit, which is

>>> free: http://marcedit.reeset.net/ Presumably, you could then load

>>> them into CollectiveAccess.

>>>

>>> As far as I know, All Music Guide metadata isn't free, but if that

>>> is inaccurate, I'd love to be corrected.

>>>

>>> I hope you find software that works for you, Peter, and if you

>>> discover something fabulous, please let us know!

>>>

>>> Marsha Maguire (retired LC cataloger)

>>>

>>>

>>

>>