# itunes question about keeping soundtrack music in 1 album



## KindleGirl (Nov 11, 2008)

I have several soundtracks loaded into iTunes and of course they are a compilation of multiple artists. It keeps separating each artist out and doesn't keep the album together for easier syncing. How do I do that? According to a manual I have, I have the correct boxes checked for iTunes to do that, however it is not working. Any ideas?


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## Sandpiper (Oct 28, 2008)

In iTunes on your computer and on an Apple device, you can look at / play music by song title, album, artist, playlist, and genre.  It should be OK.


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## VictoriaP (Mar 1, 2009)

I go in and alter all the metadata for things like that.  For example, I have a copy of Mozart's Requiem mass.  Every song had different artists listed (vocalists, mostly), and it never sorted quite right.  Plus the album title was way too long for my iPhone to show completely.  I gave in and redid all the artists' names to Mozart--because that's how I think of it--and changed the album title to just "Requiem".  Same thing with a Paul McCartney "best of"--I don't care that some songs were with Wings, or a duet, or whatever.  They're all McCartney, and now they're listed that way so they sort the way I expect to see them.

I also had a problem with two albums by different artists that were both titled Greatest Hits.  Looking at them in album view on the iPhone, all the songs were mixed together as one album.  I finally retitled one of them to include the artist's name; now they actually show as separate albums in the iPod app.

iTunes is a truly utterly horrid piece of software, but it's the only game in town.


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## pidgeon92 (Oct 27, 2008)

Any software is only going to be as good as the data it has. Definitely go in and change the album info so it is arranged as you want it.


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## KindleGirl (Nov 11, 2008)

Thanks...I will give that a try & hopefully get things the way I want it.


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## KindleGirl (Nov 11, 2008)

pidgeon92 said:


> Any software is only going to be as good as the data it has. Definitely go in and change the album info so it is arranged as you want it.


What's the easiest way to do that? I've been able to change a few but it doesn't let me click on them to change the name. I've just been going into 'music' and then clicking to play the song...which brings up all of the info. It doesn't seem to want me to click and change it there, though. Where do I go to do that?


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## telracs (Jul 12, 2009)

KindleGirl said:


> What's the easiest way to do that? I've been able to change a few but it doesn't let me click on them to change the name. I've just been going into 'music' and then clicking to play the song...which brings up all of the info. It doesn't seem to want me to click and change it there, though. Where do I go to do that?


Here's my suggestion. In iTunes, in your music library search so you only have that album showing. Highlight all the songs, and right click. click "get info" it will ask if you really want to edit multiple songs, say yes. Then change the album name for all of them. It should then group them together. Also, make sure you are sorting by album, not by artist or anything else, so that they'll stay together.


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## telracs (Jul 12, 2009)

Also, when you're editing the info, if you click on the last tab, the "options" one, change "part of compilation" to yes.


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## KindleGirl (Nov 11, 2008)

Thanks so much scarlet. That helped a lot!! I think I now have everything organized. Is there a way to tell iTunes that a CD is all part of a compilation when you copy it into iTunes? Or do I always have to manually go into the info. and change it? Seems like there should be a way to import it into iTunes the correct way, but then again it's iTunes and it doesn't seem like they use the easiest way to do things.


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## pidgeon92 (Oct 27, 2008)

iTunes uses the Gracenote database to get the song tags.... These tags are user-input, so whatever the original user has input, that is what you are getting. If you want something different, you are going to have to alter the data yourself after you import.


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## telracs (Jul 12, 2009)

No problem kindlegirl.  And as pidgeon said, you are going to have to do them after you import.


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## KindleGirl (Nov 11, 2008)

Ok, thanks. I was afraid that would be the answer but thought I'd check anyway and see if I could save some time.


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## 911jason (Aug 17, 2009)

After you import a CD like this, click on your Music Library in the upper right corner of iTunes, then if you don't already have a column header for DATE ADDED, right click on one of the column headers and then go and check DATE ADDED. Now you can sort your music library by the date the track was added by simply clicking that DATE ADDED column header and moving all the way to the top of the list. Now the stuff you just added will be all together at the top of the list. You can click on the first track and then hold down Shift and click on the last track and it will select all of them so you can edit them at once. Right Click on one of the selected tracks and choose GET INFO. You may get a warning about editing multiple tracks, just OK it and then you can edit the info for all the tracks at once. This works well for changing Album titles as mentioned earlier, also for adding Album Artwork or making other changes to multiple files at once.

Hope this wasn't too confusing and is somewhat helpful!


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