iTunes - Can I sort on 2 keys?

[JPA]

Is there any way to sort on a second key? For instance if I want to see song titles alphabetically within artist; i.e. all Abba songs alphabetically; then Abra Moore songs alphabetically; then Aimee Mann songs alphabetically?

 

[GGJstudios]

Unfortunately, no. Only the built-in Album by Artist and Album by Year (by Artist).

 

[JPA]

I was afraid of that. Well, thanks for answering.

 

[smitty078]

See if the column browser will provide what you want. Enable with "Menu Bar --> View --> Show Column Browser" It is also fairly customizable, allowing you to add different columns. So to achieve what you asked for, you could add the column for Artist. Then, you will have an alphabetical listing of artists. You can then sort songs by name. You can then select more than one artist at a time by using command + click. If your songs are sorted by name, they will now sort by artist then by name for the selected artists in the column browser. It's a little tricky but I think this is what you are looking for.

 

[JPA]

Thanks, Smitty. I'll play around with that.

 

[Consultant]

Just type the artist's name in search field and sort by song name.

 

[GGJstudios]

See if the column browser will provide what you want. Enable with "Menu Bar --> View --> Show Column Browser" It is also fairly customizable, allowing you to add different columns. So to achieve what you asked for, you could add the column for Artist. Then, you will have an alphabetical listing of artists. You can then sort songs by name. You can then select more than one artist at a time by using command + click. If your songs are sorted by name, they will now sort by artist then by name for the selected artists in the column browser. It's a little tricky but I think this is what you are looking for.

This won't work. The column browser is a filter, not a sort mechanism. If you select Artists with the column browser, then sort by Name, the songs are not grouped by Artist.

Just type the artist's name in search field and sort by song name.

Unfortunately, that's no different than using the column browser. It's not sorting by a 2nd key and doesn't accomplish what the OP asked.

Is there any way to sort on a second key? For instance if I want to see song titles alphabetically within artist; i.e. all Abba songs alphabetically; then Abra Moore songs alphabetically; then Aimee Mann songs alphabetically?

There is no way to sort by Artist and also sort by song Name within Artists.

 

[JPA]

I guess I made a mistake by giving the example I gave of what I was after since artist is so easily selectable. I thought I was simplifying the question by giving a simple example. But what I was wondering was the more general case of any two fields. For instance I was really wanting to sort by my rating hi to lo, and within that by play count lo to hi, to use that as a guide to find songs I like that I haven't been listening to much. But I can do a decent workaround by creating a separate smart playlist for each star rating and sorting each one by play count.

I guess the two-field sort is something that the old MusicMatch Jukebox did better than iTunes, at least until Yahoo bought it out and killed it.