This would not work for many of the albums we’ve been talking about. An album that is a re-recording of one composer’s music, performed by a single artist/orchestra, is not a VA release.
I didn’t say to replace artist with VA, but removing composers from RG will clean their pages from albums they are not associated with, but they will keep on being associated to their composer by clicking on “Show official various artist release groups” at the bottom of their page.
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I’ve actually never used those links – didn’t even realize they were there.
That would take a lot of study to form an opinion. It seems like it would have a profound effect on how the database is organized, and it would affect composers like Beethoven and Mozart as well. It doesn’t seem compatible with the way the music industry views classical. But, as I said, it would take some study.
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It does not make it clear at all. As is seen in the example I supplied in the above image . Listed under “albums” are albums of Barry’s non-classical pop work, there are albums of his performances, and two albums of re-recordings by the City of Prague Orchestra that he does not have an involvement with. All mushed together under albums. CSG applied to those Prague performances makes it impossible to spot his work. Only that disambig is acting as a clue as to what is not his stuff.
I also don’t see the logic of trying to rely on tags. I would not call a track like Goldfinger “classical”. It is Shirley Bassey knocking out a hit that also went up the charts. But you have added more no votes to some of my older edits that is now applying your logic of “anything done by an orchestra is classical” even though you claimed above that this isn’t the case. That is a quite fundamental difference to what some of us think is classical.
Yeah, I get it you want to tag your collection in a certain way. But this seems against the logic of the database when you apply this to pop tunes.
I have never seen a discography show every cover version of someone’s work. Go to Wikipedia, or the artist’s own websites or autobiographies and it will list their own work. Elsewhere in MB “artist’s intent” is important, but you are changing those rules when an orchestra appears.
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Should we care how the music industry views classical?
But, I don’t think it’s a massive change needed in the DB to cope with the idea of not putting composers in artist credits for releases/RGs, which forces a credit to be either classical or not classical.
What’s needed is way to bubble up the work or recording credits to the surface of the artist’s page, so people can choose to include releases with works composed by that artist. Or any of the other relationships we have, like arranged.
Currently if you were interested in interpretations of an artists work, you have to go through works, which means picking each one and seeing who’s covered it, not exactly the quickest task.
There is no John Barry, Ennio Morricone, John Williams, etc. in that list.
If we look on those composer’s Wikipedia pages, the closest I see those write-ups to say “classical” is in the phrase “classical and film composer” which seems to keep that very distinct. And I never see any other performer appearing in their discographies.
The word “classical” never appears on Barry’s page. Bond music is especially written in a pop style to make them chart hits. (And he does much more than just Bond) @Beckfield you say that an orchestra does not make something classical, but have put No votes on a compilation of John Barry pop tunes that are being interpreted by an Orchestra.
In the past months I have often popped variations of this same question at internet searches “Is Film Music Classical?” and hit articles like this: Can film music ever be classical? | Classical music | The Guardian
You have in this thread confirmed that an orchestra does not make something Classical, but are currently voting No on a CD of Barry pop tunes played by an orchestra. Not even close to being a Soundtrack. You seem to be voting against both the classical world and CSG’s own themes. As well as against the orchestra’s “artist intent” to be recognised for the music it is selling on Spotify in its own name.
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It may be annoying for the display from the pop artists side, but I do think that if an orchestra is playing something, we should credit the composer, so CSG is consistent.
Should the display be improved? Definitely.
Not a perfect solution, but maybe having a classical flag (ticket) and simply being able to hide those releases from the display would help?
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Barry isn’t there, but Williams and Morricone are, as are Howard Shore and Jerry Goldsmith. Maybe Barry needs to be added.
Yes, opinions vary as to whether film music can be classical. I linked a couple places that say yes, you found a couple that say no. My opinion is “Yes,” and I will continue to vote that way until a compelling reason to change my opinion is presented.
I explained my no vote on the Barry collection in the edit notes, so I won’t re-hash it here.
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Its not really a classical flag that is the issue here. It is about the side effect of what CSG tagging does to discographies. This is more about the treatment of a third party doing a cover. When an orchestra covers the Beatles I understand that would be good to see associated to the Beatles page, but not in the middle of their album list. When The City of Prague Orchestra re-records John Barry’s pop tunes it is something that needs a separated category in some way. This same extends to film music from Ennio Morricone. Just ticking a “classical” option on every orchestra piece would not separate Ennio’s own performances out from these covers. When you want to listen to a film sound track the first choice will always be the original.
I have plenty of orchestral music that covers rock and pop but none of this is in the database listed by composer. I’ve found all of that listed under the orchestra’s name. Just like when the Easy Star All-Stars do their version of Dark Side of the Moon - the performers get the main credits for their interpretation.
I understand there are a group of people who like to tag their music in a certain way. I’m not here to argue against those. I don’t like arguments. What I am asking is we have a way of making it work for both sides. Even the Classical world can’t agree if Film music is Classical, so why is that debate in MB? This is supposed to be a database of facts. This is a brilliant database that could handle relationship in a way that could work for all. Currently we have an area of film music that is legitimately seen in different ways by two very different groups of people who are both correct.
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Indeed, my suggestion is specifically to let you remove them from the middle of the album list.
That could be done simply doing this When does classical style apply to film music albums? - #40 by Antiguastrea
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I did get the point of the suggestion, and like the idea, but a “classical” flag would not work there as some people want to call “Film Music” and “Orchestral Performance” always classical. So you would not be able to separate original Ennio orchestral performances from City of Prague re-recordings.
It is from my working on John Barry’s discography by buying and reading one of his biographies did I end up going down this painful path.
In the pop\rock side of the database the performer is most important. On the classical side it is the writer. It is when the two overlap we get the confusions that a performer is now buried under re-recordings. Having some way to make it stand out when the Artist who’s page it is is also the Performer it what I was looking at.
I really never wanted to be in a debate about what is or is not classical. I just wanted to see when someone performs their own work like on the pop\rock side of the database.
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Still, it requires that an release be put in one of two baskets permanently. The ideal would be a dynamic display, in the same way we have offical release groups / all release groups / etc.
Something like “all release groups where the artist has a composer credit on a work in a release” (or other credits tbh).
There are other benefits to this I think. Like, an artists who’s worked with several bands, you’d be able to see a combined discography for example.
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That is exactly what I was suggesting 
A toggle to hide or show them among the other releases.
But it’s an idle suggestion, since I don’t face this problem myself. Someone else would have to flesh the idea out and make a ticket/s.
(that said I have tried to tackle some aspects of this in the MB redesign mockups, and I’ll keep this discussion in mind. We may be able to try integrate more solutions there.)
That doesn’t solve the issue with there being cases of releases which have some classical aspects, where some might want them to be styled classically, and some won’t.
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Or where classical releases throw the band name on the cover when they cover one track… Edit #100165241 - MusicBrainz
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I am really confused on that one. Mercury is the composer, so shouldn’t it be him credited and not Queen?
The Classical styleguide bans all free thought and they have to use the names on the front cover…
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But that doesn’t make sense when the composers name is wrong like that. Anywhere else MB use correct data. Just when I thought I was getting to understand it is a list of composers I now see it is not. It is one guideline I still am very confused about and don’t want to go back into that debate again.