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Poll

How do you arrange your Songs and Album folders?

1 Level:  Music\Artist - Album - T# - Title.codec
[ 23 ] (2.6%)
2 Level:  Music\Artist - Album\T# - Title.codec
[ 137 ] (15.6%)
3 Level:  Music\Artist\Album\T# - Title.codec
[ 350 ] (39.9%)
3 Lev. w/Year: Music\Artist\YEAR - Album\T# - Title.codec
[ 200 ] (22.8%)
Other (this pertains to directory structure ONLY.)
[ 168 ] (19.1%)

Total Members Voted: 1043

Topic: Your Music Directory Structure (Read 151822 times) previous topic - next topic
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Your Music Directory Structure

Reply #150 –
Personally I tend to shy away from putting genres in the majority of my folder names because they can be so subjective and they're still evolving.  Sometimes I even find myself going back and changing the genre in my ID3 tags.  For example, I had the band "Explosions in the Sky" labeled as "rock (instrumental)" because they play rock music without singing.  Months later I found out there's a popular term nowadays for that type of music called "Post Rock."  It's hard keeping up with all the musical trends sometimes.  Anyway, my basic folder structure breaks down like this:

Full CD's:
G:\Audio\At the Drive-In\[2000] Relationship of Command\01 - Arcarsenal.mp3

In each CD directory I keep a log of the rip, a playlist file and an image of the cd cover entitled "art.jpg."  I tried the "folder.jpg" method but windows constantly got the thumbnails confused.  I'm not a big fan of deep directories.  Each disc in a multiple-disc release gets its own respective folder.  I also frequently include a [MISC] folder in an artist's directory for random live songs and tracks which were not part of an official release.

Compilations:
G:\..\Compilation - Motown Legends (Volume 1)\[1994] Motown Legends (Volume 1)\Track Number - Artist - Track Title.mp3

Soundtracks:
G\..\Soundtrack - Rushmore\[1999] Rushmore (OST)\Track Number - Artist - Track Title.mp3

I use the prefix "Soundtrack" as opposed to "OST" in the folder name because, for the life of me, I can't expect someone new to digital music to alphabetically go to the O's to find a soundtrack. 

The only time I use the genre in a folder name is for comedy and to clump together large groups of miscallenous single songs:
G\..\Comedy - Seinfeld, Jerry\[1997] I'm Telling You for the Last Time\01 - Intro-Phones.mp3
G\..\Misc - 80's\Artist - Track Name.mp3
G\..\Misc - Dance\Artist - Track Name.mp3

Hello to everyone by the way!  This is my first post but I've been using the site as a wonderful learning tool for a while now.  Figured this was a good thread to start in considering the organization of my own music collection is the only aspect of digital music I know more about than anyone else here.

Your Music Directory Structure

Reply #151 –
Finally settled on something thorough but easy to navigate:

Albums
Music\Albums\Artist\(Date) Album\nn Title

Compilations and splits
Music\Compilations\(Date) Album\nn Artist - Title

Classical
Music\Classical\Composer*\Album (Ensemble - Conductor)\nn Title
* Sorted by last name.

CD Images
Music\CD Images\Artist - Date - Album.wv/flac
we was young an' full of beans

Your Music Directory Structure

Reply #152 –
muzic\genre\subgenre\artist\[year] album\track# - title.container

it takes a helluva time to find a subgenre for certain artists/groups..
I love the moderators.

Your Music Directory Structure

Reply #153 –
Hmm... isn't sorting by genre like that kind of limiting?  For instance, many artists have songs that fit into more than one genre categories, and genres are largely a matter of opinion, so a song could be more than one genre, right?

Personally, I think it makes more sense to keep genre information in the tag, and not in the filesystem.  You can use a number of programs, albumlisters, or database utilities to sort your music by genre when you want to look for a certain type of music, and that way would be much more extensible, so that those songs that could be either rock or country, say, depending on your mood or opinion, would show up in either seach without having to have them on the disk twice.

Out of curiousity, does foobar's albumlist component have this functionality?  I seem to think it does, but I haven't used it much.

Your Music Directory Structure

Reply #154 –
Quote from: Supacon on
Hmm... isn't sorting by genre like that kind of limiting?  For instance, many artists have songs that fit into more than one genre categories, and genres are largely a matter of opinion, so a song could be more than one genre, right?


You are exactly correct except often artists are known for a certain genre. For example, Jethro Tull do blues, classic rock, folk rock, etc.. but I would class them as Prog-Rock. I would rather seperate my oldish music to today's new music scene aswell.

Heres how I organise my files:
Albums/EP's/Singles:
..\Albums\Genre\Sub-Genre\Artist\Album\## Song Title.ext

Singles: (single .mp3 files that wern't realeased as singles but didn't on an album)
..\Single Songs\Artist - Song Title.ext

Bootlegs: (live, unauthorised recordings)
..\Bootlegs\Artist\(Year) Album\## Song Title.ext

Compilations: (often VA)
..\Albums\Genre\Sub-Genre\Various Artist\Album\## Song Title.ext
or
..\Compilations\Genre\Sub-Genre\Album\## Song Title.ext **

**rarely its this because I like the first structure better.

Your Music Directory Structure

Reply #155 –
Here is my music directory structure.

Have a album playlist on all my albums in the album folder as

Artist - Album

also have a album art image on each album folder as

Folder.jpg

Albums, EPs and Singles:

I store albums, singles and EPs in 1 folder called Albums since EPs are like mini albums and most singles have more then 1 or 2 tracks.

Albums

Music\Albums\Artist - Album\Track # - Artist - Title.codec

eg

Music\Albums\Fear Factory - Demanufacture\04 - Fear Factory - Replica.mp3

also double disc albums are stored in the same folder as:

Music\Albums\Artist - Album\Disc # Track # - Artist - Title.codec

eg

Disc 1

Music\Albums\Black Sabbath - We Sold Our Soul For Rock 'N' Roll\1 04 - Black Sabbath - Paranoid.mp3

Disc 2

Music\Albums\Black Sabbath - We Sold Our Soul For Rock 'N' Roll\2 09 - Black Sabbath - Snowblind.mp3

EPs

Music\Albums\Artist - Album (EP)\Track # - Artist - Title.codec

eg

Music\Albums\Nine Inch Nails - Broken (EP)\06 - Nine Inch Nails - Gave Up.mp3

Singles

Music\Albums\Artist - Album (Single)\Track # - Artist - Title.codec

Compilations

Music\Compilations\Album\Track # - Artist # Title.codec

eg

Music\Compilations\Relapse Records Sampler\15 - Zeke - Chinatown.mp3

Soundtracks

Music\Soundtracks\Media Type\Album\Track # - Artist # Title.codec

eg

Music\Soundtracks\Video Game Soundtracks\Quake II OST\06 - Sonic Mayhem - Quad Machine.mp3

Misc (Non-released, podcasts and non-album playlists)

Music\
"I never thought I'd see this much candy in one mission!"

Your Music Directory Structure

Reply #156 –
Mine is:


\Music\_Soundtracks_\Album\Album Artist - Year - Album - Track# - Artist - Title.xyz

\Music\_Techno_\Year - Album\Album Artist - Year - Album - Track# - Artist - Title.xyz

\Music\_Various_\Year - Album\Album Artist - Year - Album - Track# - Artist - Title.xyz

\Music\A\Artist\Album Artist - Year - Album - Track# - Title.xyz

\Music\B\Artist\Album Artist - Year - Album - Track# - Title.xyz

Basically most compilations are sorted according to techno/soundtracks/various, everything else sorted into #/first letter folder, then artist folder.

I don't use album folders for non-compilations.

Album art is stored either artist - album.jpg or album.jpg, and also in tags where possible.

Also in most situations, I store multi-disc sets as one album and use the track numbers to indicate disc... IE  101 for disc 1 track 1, 201 for disc 2 track 1, etc etc.

Your Music Directory Structure

Reply #157 –
For me:
GENRE\ARTIST\ALBUM [YEAR]\TITLE.CODEC
note: the genre is often innaccurate

Your Music Directory Structure

Reply #158 –
Quote from: Aankhen on
Quote from: Cornie on

Live shows: Artist\Venue\Date\[Disc #/Set #]\nn - title.codec
  This would be for any LIVE recordings (bootlegs)...
      The 4th level defaults to 'Disc' unless all tracks fit one disc - in which case it splits by 'Set'

What is a 'Set'?


lol... been away from the computer awhile 
anyway.... ever been to a concert? Typically the headliner(main) band will play more then one 'set' of songs

Your Music Directory Structure

Reply #159 –
My MP3's are are labeled with track number and title like so: "05 Just my Imagination"
Those are placed in a folder labeled like so: "Cranberries 1999 Bury the Hatchet"
And those folders are in my MP3 folder.

Don't have to much on my computer as of now, but as I rip and the number of folders grow I probably will make artist folders labeled simply "Cranberries" where I store all my Cranberries albums (and singles). Those subfolders will still be labeled "Artist Year Songtitle"

Your Music Directory Structure

Reply #160 –
While I have mine:
\music\Artist - Year - Album\Track# - TrackTitle.Codec
File structure makes a poor database.
Creature of habit.

Your Music Directory Structure

Reply #161 –
Hi Everybody,

my Directorystucture is as follows:
X:\Audio\A...Z\Artist\Album\Titel.Codec

For multible CD's in one Album:
X:\Audio\A...Z\Artist\Album\CD1..CD2\Title.Codec

For ripped Vinyl:
X:\Audio\A...Z\Artist\Album\Side1...Side2\Title.Codec

For sampler and soundtracks:
X:\Audio\A...Z\Album\Title.Codec
X:\Audio\A...Z\Album\CD1...CD2\Title.codec
X:\Audio\A...Z\Album\Side1...Side2\Title.codec

Everything else is organized with the tags and in a database.

Greetings
Christian

Your Music Directory Structure

Reply #162 –
Music\Genre\Artist\Artist - Year - Album\Artist - Album - Track number - Title.codec
FLAC.

Your Music Directory Structure

Reply #163 –
I voted as the second choice, however, I do incorporate the year.
Actual directory structure of HD:
(drive letter):\music\albums\(artist - (year) disc title)\(T# - song name.codec)

"soundtracks" and "recorded" in "music" dir as well.

This makes the albums appear with artists in alphabetical order and their albums in chronological order.
It's due for a good DEGAUSSIN'

Your Music Directory Structure

Reply #164 –
I voted none.

My structure is as follows:

ALBUM-XXX/Release_Name
ALBUM-XXX/Release_Name
ALBUM-XXX/Release_Name
LiVESET-XXX/EVENT/Event_Name/Release_Name
LiVESET-XXX/SHOW/Artist-Show_Name/Release_Name
ViNYL-XXX/A/Release_Name
ViNYL-XXX/B/Release_Name

etc. Where XXX is either "HARD", "OTHER", "SOFT" and for some categories a few exceptions.

For the ViNYL section I separate the releases in letters, because well, there's such a shitload of stuff there.  I put DJ_X in the X letter and also The_X in the X letter. Which could be a bit confusing sometimes.

This works very well for me, since I like "hard" music. Hardcore, hardstyle, jump, etc. I don't listen much to the other stuff, so it's in a separate category. It's mainly for "having it". I don't listen very much to the cabaret stuff either, since it's usually nice to hear it once and also it isn't really music. So a special category for that too.

Some examples:
I:\ALBUM-HARD\Qlimax_-_Mixed_By_Lady_Dana-2001-TWCMP3
I:\ALBUM-OTHER\Extince_-_Vitamine_E_DUTCH-Retail-2001-TWCMP3
I:\ALBUM-CABARET\Hans_Teeuwen-Trui-2CD-2000-REV (this is such an exception)

I:\LiVESET-HARD\EVENT\Sensation_Black\Sensation_Black_2004_-_Luna_Live-07-10-CABLE-2004-XDS_INT
I:\LiVESET-HARD\SHOW\VA-Club_Fresh_Hardhouse\Deepack_-_Hardhouse_Generation_(FreshFM)-FM-14-11-2007-HBLiVE
I:\LiVESET-SOFT\EVENT\Sensation_White\IDT_Sensation_White_2004_Afterparty-Live_At_ID-T_Radio-Read-NFO-CABLE-07-03-2004-TWCLIVE
I:\LiVESET-HARD\SHOW\Blutoniums_Brian_M_Vs_McBunn-Harder_Styles\Blutoniums_Brian_M_Vs_Mcbunn_-_Harder_Styles_003__Incl_DJ_Vortex_Guestmix_(DI.FM)-SBD-27-06-2006-HBLiVE

I:\ViNYL-HARD\#\3_Steps_Ahead-Drop_It__The_Prophet_Remix-Promo_CDR-2003-MiM
I:\ViNYL-HARD\G\Gizmo_and_Symastic-Listen_Up-Vinyl-2006-SND
I:\ViNYL-HARD\T\Technoboy-Into_Deep__Into_Dub-Vinyl-2006-SDS
I:\ViNYL-SOFT\B\Barthezz_-_On_the_Move-CDM-2001-iDC

Your Music Directory Structure

Reply #165 –
Full albums:
Full Albums\%artist% - %album%\%artist% - %track% - %title%.ext

Multi-disc albums:
Full Albums\%artist% - %album%\Disc %discnumber%\%artist% - %track% - %title%.ext

Soundtracks/compilations:
Full Albums\%album artist% - %album%\%track% - %track artist% - %title%.ext

Singles (in varying folders):
%artist% - %title%.ext

Album art, for full albums is always:
Full Albums\%album artist% - %album%\cover.jpg

which means that for multi-disc albums, I just have one picture.  Rarely, a boxed set will have different covers for each disc, then those go inside the Disc %discnumber% folder with the tracks.

The duplication of %artist% bothers me from time to time, but this way the tracks can be singles without losing any important information.

Your Music Directory Structure

Reply #166 –
More precisely:

MyMusic\Artist\Album\T# Title.codec

Your Music Directory Structure

Reply #167 –
i do:

music\artist\date.album\track.title

Your Music Directory Structure

Reply #168 –
Release type\%artist%\%album%\[%discnumber%\]%tracknumber% %title%.filetype

Release type is one of the following:
  • Albums
  • Bootlegs
  • Collections, Tributes and Soundtracks
  • EPs
  • Greatest Hits and Boxed Sets
  • Loose Tracks
  • New Music
elevatorladylevitateme

Your Music Directory Structure

Reply #169 –
AlbumArtist\Album\TrackNumber Name.mp3
AlbumArtist\Album\DiscNumber-TrackNumber Name.mp3

Your Music Directory Structure

Reply #170 –
mine is:
Music\Artist - Year - Album\Track # - Title.codec

but i only use this way because thats how i started to sort my collection

eventually i'll sort it like this:
Music\Artist\Year - Album\Track # - Title.codec
can foobar do this for me or can i do this with a script or something?

Your Music Directory Structure

Reply #171 –
My structure is: Music\ALBUM ARTIST\[DATE] ALBUM\(DISCNUMBER)TRACKNUMBER TITLE

@ArtMustHurt: foobar2000 can do it using the "Move to" dialog and Titleformatting.

Here's the titleformatting that I use to move to my music from my downloads folder to my music folder:
Code: [Select]
$if($stricmp($left(%ALBUM ARTIST%,4),'The '),$substr(%ALBUM ARTIST%,5,$len(%ALBUM ARTIST%))', The ',%ALBUM ARTIST%)\['['%date%']'] %album%\[%discnumber%]%tracknumber% %title%


The bits before the first backslash just move "The" to the end of the Album Artist folder name.

Your Music Directory Structure

Reply #172 –
Quote from: Supacon on
I'm interested in finding out what kinds of directory structures all the audio collectors around here use for archiving their collections.  I'm interested in establishing some kind of a "standard" for myself, at least, based on what is most popular with the smart people into this stuff.

This poll ONLY pertains to your directory structure, and not your filename structure. Also, the name of your music root folders is irrelevant (Whether it happens to be "C:\Documents and Settings\username\My Documents\My Music\" (the default place for music on a Windows system) or "/" (a unix root partition).

For myself, I generally have been using C:\Music\Artist\Album\ and then having the files themselves named so that they are numbered by track.

More recently, for artists whose albums I have more than one of, I've been naming the album directory with the Year, usually as "2005 - Album Title", but I've historically used "(2005) Album Title", and sometimes even "Album Title (2005)", but that doesn't have the advantage of the folders being sorted in order of year.

I'd like to work through my music collection and rename every directory and file consistently one of these days, because over the years I've done so many different things.


As I've said many times before on this forum, the directory structure is NOT VERY IMPORTANT.  What's important is that the TAGS are consistent, well-organized, and well thought-out.

My directory structure is simple.  At the top is a root.  (say "music" or "audio").  It should NEVER be a specific drive letter like "C:".  First of all that's a Windows convention so what would happen if you moved your collection to a different environment?  And, second, what if you move your collection to another drive, e.g., an external USB drive or a NAS?  Then the letter would change.  So your root should never be drive-letter-dependent.

Under that I basically have classical and non-classical music.  Classical music is organized into folders of composers, and then all the relevant tracks are under that.  Non-classical music is organized into folders of artists, with all the tracks a level below that.  So, for example, all my Rolling Stones songs are in the same folder, all my Billie Holiday songs are in the same folder, ditto my Bob Wills and his Texas Playboys, ditto all my Feist  ( a small collection so far), all my Radiohead, all my Moby, etc. 

I have over 10,000 tracks, about half classical, half nonclassical, and I add maybe 20 or 30 tracks a week, and this simple, easy system works great!  The heavy lifting is done by the tagging scheme.  Ambiguities are never a problem -  I have 3 versions of Dvorak's Op. 90 'Dumky' trio for instance; I have 3 versions of "Everything in its Right Place" (the Radiohead song) - one by Radiohead, and covers by a jazz pianist and a classical pianist.  I have FIVE versions of "Orange Blossom Special" - two different ones by Bill Monroe and  3 more by other artists.

I play this music on my PC, on my two iPods, and on my Sonos system and my simple directory scheme  (with a sophisticated tagging scheme) works great!  Also, I hope it's clear from my above comments that I'm a serious music lover with eclectic tastes and a big collection so if this works for me it will work for ANYbody!

Your Music Directory Structure

Reply #173 –
I have:

h:\Music\Albums
h:\Music\Singles
h:\Music\EPs
h:\Music\Soundtracks
h:\Music\Compilations
h:\Music\DJ Mixes

Each of these uses artist\album\n. trackname.codec

Does the job, very nicely too