Tools I Find Useful: MusicBee
      Over the years I have amassed a decent sized collection of audio files. Mostly music, but there is the occasional speech or similar in the mix. Organizing this collection has become a larger problem as it has grown. Was easy enough when it was just the 5 music CD’s I have. Remember back when music was a physical object? How times have changed.

      The main thing I was looking for was a way to tag music in a few specific ways, and then play music that matches those tags. Wasn’t a high priority, so never really went looking, but I’ve kept my eyes open for a tool to make this task easier. Beyond that, everything else was a bonus. Well I think I’ve found one: MusicBee.

Metadata
      While there are online tagging services that make much of the tagging easier, they aren’t directly of use to me. Sure, it’s nice to know that song is in this genre, but that’s tangential to my usage. I’m primarily interested in whether the song has voices (ie singing) or is purely instrumental. After that, how ‘fast’ it is. Is it slow and puts you to sleep, or fast and has you wanting to move. I haven’t seen an automated service that will tag for that. So I had to go through my whole collection and apply tags for instrumental, speed, and rating. As they are all songs I know, didn’t take very long.

      With that tagging being done, I could then build ‘Mixers’. Not traditional Playlists (although I did some of that too), as those are static lists. The Mixers let me define criteria, and then they grab songs that match them.

      For example, I’ve got one Mixer that grabs only ‘not-slow’ songs without voices, with a bias towards high rating. So when I want background music that doesn’t put me to sleep, start that one up and it will play away. Reversely, when I do want to go to sleep, I’ve got another one of just slow songs, again without voices.

      The point is, any arbitrary way you want a list built, it supports it. Want only songs from between 1980 and 1990? Or only ones in the ‘Rock’ genre? Or only movie soundtracks? Songs starting with the letter ‘B’? If it’s part of the metadata attached to the song, you can sort by it. And once the criteria is set, no need to redo it. Save the mix and start it up again as needed.

      If you find a particular song is being played too often, and you don’t like it as much, no need to change the mix. Just change the rating of that song, and if you set the bias right in the mix, it will come up less often.

      Can also check for ‘not set’, thus making a list of songs that don’t have particular data. Great for finding any that are missing the information, so you can add it.

Portable
      As an added bonus, MusicBee has a portable version. This means you could copy it, and your music collection, to a USB stick. Then, instead of having to take your computer to an event, just plug the USB stick into any computer already there.

      Also makes the inevitable moving to a new system easier. As there is nothing to configure on reinstall, just copy over the files and your done.

Internet?
      Yes, I know there are a variety of internet based music services that can provide most (if not all) of the benefits I list above. While I will acknowledge the potential use of those services, I considered the required network connection a deal breaker here. If only because I fully expect to want to listen to music when the internet is not available (for whatever reason).

Conclusion
      While it did take some time to apply the metadata, MusicBee fills a useful niche in programs I use. Maybe it could for you as well. Maybe not, that’s your call to make.