Music - Missing Features, Bugs, Issues & Troubleshooting

[chrisdazzo]

Cool, now the "inconsistent song playback volume" bug, even with Sound Check turned on, is present on Big Sur. Thought we had reserved this issue for iOS and Homepod. 🙄 So frustrating, and seems only to happen with AIFF files (88% of my 13,888-song library).

Anyone else having this issue?

 

[ErikGrim]

Cool, now the "inconsistent song playback volume" bug, even with Sound Check turned on, is present on Big Sur. Thought we had reserved this issue for iOS and Homepod. 🙄 So frustrating, and seems only to happen with AIFF files (88% of my 13,888-song library).

Anyone else having this issue?

Can you not convert the AIFFs to ALAC as a workaround?

 

[chrisdazzo]

Can you not convert the AIFFs to ALAC as a workaround?

Absolutely can, but has that actually been proven to help? Seems like a simple enough fix...

 

[daveedjackson]

anyone else getting this? blank tabs for other options. I have it system wide....

 

[La BESTIA]

Hey gals and lads! Cut to the chase, every single time after trying to close the Music app on Big Sur macOS, this message pops up, lasting forever, forcing me to force quite the app. What's wrong here?

Cheers!
La BESTIA

 

[mikzn]

Hey gals and lads! Cut to the chase, every single time after trying to close the Music app on Big Sur macOS, this message pops up, forcing me to force quite the app. What's wrong here?

Cheers!
La BESTIA

I had something similar and it was not saving any changes etc. - I closed the Music app an then opened "holding the option key" to browse "Choose Library" and connnect it to the "Music Library.musiclibrary" file and it was fine after that

Seemed like it lost the connection somehow - not sure if that is the same for you - but maybe worth a whirl?

 

[ErikGrim]

Absolutely can, but has that actually been proven to help? Seems like a simple enough fix...

It's worth a go. I assume you don't need the files to be in AIFF. ALAC is a much more space efficient format, and support for it is pretty much universal - even if you need the files for music production.

 

[La BESTIA]

I had something similar and it was not saving any changes etc. - I closed the Music app an then opened "holding the option key" to browse "Choose Library" and connnect it to the "Music Library.musiclibrary" file and it was fine after that

Seemed like it lost the connection somehow - not sure if that is the same for you - but maybe worth a whirl?

Thanks a bunch for your response! Will give it a fling and let you guys know how it goes!

 

[La BESTIA]

I had something similar and it was not saving any changes etc. - I closed the Music app an then opened "holding the option key" to browse "Choose Library" and connnect it to the "Music Library.musiclibrary" file and it was fine after that

Seemed like it lost the connection somehow - not sure if that is the same for you - but maybe worth a whirl?

So far, so good!

💃🏽💃🏽💃🏽

 

[chrisdazzo]

It's worth a go. I assume you don't need the files to be in AIFF. ALAC is a much more space efficient format, and support for it is pretty much universal - even if you need the files for music production.

Yup, no real need, just that natively, xACT converts from FLAC to AIFF 🙂 Wonder how long it'll take to convert 12,203 AIFF files... so long, play history?

 

[ErikGrim]

Yup, no real need, just that natively, xACT converts from FLAC to AIFF 🙂 Wonder how long it'll take to convert 12,203 AIFF files... so long, play history?

Converting them in Music will preserve your metadata including play history. It'll probably take a while, but depending on your CPU and SSD speed not much time for each track.

For future reference I use this one to convert straight from FLAC to ALAC.

It's pretty much instant.

 

[La BESTIA]

So far, so good!

💃🏽💃🏽💃🏽

It just started taking place again. So annoying!

 

[chrisdazzo]

Converting them in Music will preserve your metadata including play history. It'll probably take a while, but depending on your CPU and SSD speed not much time for each track.

For future reference I use this one to convert straight from FLAC to ALAC.
[x image x]
It's pretty much instant.

Thanks. Ended up using Music's built-in converter, which preserved all metadata except "added date", which I am genuinely sad about, but not a major loss. But after 12k+ songs converted, no change in the volume normalization (or lack thereof). Oh well. Reduced my library size by 170GB anyway.

 

[UncommonAsian]

I have this issue too, and my 7000-song library are all 256kbps AAC files. Happens with all the tracks too. Sound Check was the problem, turning it off will stop audio files from having their volumes adjusted after playback is started. Of course, this means that every song will have their own loudness level, which can vary wildly. 🙁

Cool, now the "inconsistent song playback volume" bug, even with Sound Check turned on, is present on Big Sur. Thought we had reserved this issue for iOS and Homepod. 🙄 So frustrating, and seems only to happen with AIFF files (88% of my 13,888-song library).

Anyone else having this issue?

Can you not convert the AIFFs to ALAC as a workaround?

 

[ErikGrim]

1.1.0.278 is here with a fix for Cmd-F and …nothing else.

 

[funnysharks]

Hi,

I am on Mojave 10.14.6 and iTunes 12.9.5.5. I have recently noticed that a few of my music files appear corrupt where the song would finish and then play the last 30 seconds of the song again. I have looked into this issue and can see various threads on the Apple Support Community forums where people have had the same issue, but there was no resolution and it was mentioned that this was to do with editing the metadata.

I have just tested this out and have added a new mp3 to my library and added/removed the album artwork and it has made the track time longer (was 4:03, is now 4:26). I have been tempted to update to Catalina 10.15 as I was thinking that maybe the new Music app might have fixed this and other bugs, but just browsing the forums here I have seen many threads mentioning various issues with Album Artwork.

Do you guys think I should update or just stay on Mojave? I do not subscribe for Apple Music and use my iTunes with local music files.

Thanks,

 

[mikzn]

It just started taking place again. So annoying!

that is a bummer - perhaps try upgrading to Music 1.1.0.278 ? - newest version of Big Sur?

Once I reconnected the data base it worked fine for me - might be worth making sure you are on the most up to date version of Big Sur and Music 1.1.0.278 ?

Good Luck

 

[Mr. 123]

I am still on Mojave, because of the Music app and am still unsure wether I’ll upgaprade to Big Sur this year or wait for the next OS update. I have a lot of tagged music with manually added artwork etc in iTunes which I use a lot so the bugs with the Music app on Catalina and now Big Sur have made me avoid updating.

Could anyone post a screenshot of how the album view or recently added album view looks like on a 27 inch iMac display with the itunes window covering most of the screen. I read that you can only display 5 albums at a time, but have never seen a screenshot of how it looks on a large screen. Also wondering if anyone could post a screenshot of an open album in album view to see if you can have 2 rows of track, like it is on Mojave, or if it’s just one long cantered list of tracks, with the sides of the Music app displaying nothing. Also, how do playlists work when you have album view within the playlist, is this still possible like in Mojave?

i really want to upgrade to Big Sur as the rest of the OS looks great, but Music is a dealbreaker for me, like it was with Catalina.

 

[mikzn]

Could anyone post a screenshot of how the album view or recently added album view looks like on a 27 inch iMac display with the itunes window covering most of the screen.

FWIW - IMHO - "Getting" artwork for iTunes and Music has been a downhill slide since iTunes 12.6 and is not just a Big Sur or Catalina bug.

Here are a few screen shots -

1) Big Sur / Music 1.1.0.278 on a 32 inch LG screen

2) iTunes 12.9.5.5 / Mojave on same 32 inch LG screen

3) First Screen Shot of Music when iTunes library was imported aug 2020 - 70% of art work missing - then did the "get artwork" thing and got some artwork restored but many over 30% was still missing and have been slowly adding them back manually since

 

[Traverse]

FWIW - IMHO - artwork for iTunes and Music has been a downhill slide since iTunes 12.6

Here are a few screen shots -

1) Big Sur / Music 1.1.0.278 on a 32 inch LG screen
View attachment 968692


2) iTunes 12.9.5.5 / Mojave on same 32 inch LG screen
View attachment 968694

3) First Screen Shot of Music when iTunes library was imported aug 2020 - 70% of art work missing - then did the "get artwork" thing and got some artwork restored but many over 30% was still missing and have been slowly adding them back manually since
View attachment 968697

So it looks like there is no longer wasted white columns on either side of the album artwork view on large screens, is this true? When I take the Catalina music app full screen on a 27" iMac I only get to see 6 albums per row with random unused white space on either side.

 

[Mr. 123]

Thanks for the screenshots! 6 albums is a lot less than what you can view in iTunes but the large artwork looks nice, and it’s great that the blank sides as mentioned by Traverse seem to have been removed!

How does it look when you click on an album in Big Sur? I know that the drop down menu is replaced by albums opening on a new page, but does a long album display like in your second screenshot of iTunes, where the album is divided into 2 columns or vertical rows of tracks on big displays or is it just one column or vertical row in the middle, like in Catalina?

Really worrying about the artwork though, I have over 2000 albums so not looking forward to manually add every cover. I added every cover myself and never used iTunes automatic cover download feature so maybe that makes a difference?

Another question would be, metadata, like play count, have there been any issues with that?

 

[mikzn]

So it looks like there is no longer wasted white columns on either side of the album artwork view on large screens, is this true? When I take the Catalina music app full screen on a 27" iMac I only get to see 6 albums per row with random unused white space on either side.

I don't have Catalina anymore to compare it with - but here is a full screen mode on the same 32 inch LG screen

and for anyone interested - song view - which is what I use mostly (along the mini player)

 

[mikzn]

Thanks for the screenshots! 6 albums is a lot less than what you can view in iTunes but the large artwork looks nice, and it’s great that the blank sides as mentioned by Traverse seem to have been removed!

How does it look when you click on an album in Big Sur? I know that the drop down menu is replaced by albums opening on a new page, but does a long album display like in your second screenshot of iTunes, where the album is divided into 2 columns or vertical rows of tracks on big displays or is it just one column or vertical row in the middle, like in Catalina?

Really worrying about the artwork though, I have over 2000 albums so not looking forward to manually add every cover. I added every cover myself and never used iTunes automatic cover download feature so maybe that makes a difference?

Another question would be, metadata, like play count, have there been any issues with that?

Here is the screen shot album view / big sur goes to a new page like you said but has a back button which is nice.

Yes the iTunes automatic cover download feature makes a big difference - but does not get all even if they used to work - I think apple no longer supports artwork from Gracenotes? anyway it is definitely worth doing it - I got half my missing artwork back that way.

No issues with meta data / playcounts are intact and imported perfectly for me / and also playlists imported perfectly also

 

[La BESTIA]

that is a bummer - perhaps try upgrading to Music 1.1.0.278 ? - newest version of Big Sur?

Once I reconnected the data base it worked fine for me - might be worth making sure you are on the most up to date version of Big Sur and Music 1.1.0.278 ?

Good Luck

Hey! Everything looks normal here!

Apple Music: 1.1.0.278
Big Sur Beta 11.0

 

[Mr. 123]

Here is the screen shot album view / big sur goes to a new page like you said but has a back button which is nice.

Yes the iTunes automatic cover download feature makes a big difference - but does not get all even if they used to work - I think apple no longer supports artwork from Gracenotes? anyway it is definitely worth doing it - I got half my missing artwork back that way.

No issues with meta data / playcounts are intact and imported perfectly for me / and also playlists imported perfectly also

Good to hear about the play count and meta data! I have many custom covers that I made myself for my own music, any issues with covers you added yourself or is it mostly the automatic cover download feature that has had issues?

Thanks for the screenshot of the album view! Is there a way to make the tracks a bit smaller? In iTunes I had 2 rows of tracks and I could display up to 75 tracks on one page on my 27 inch iMac. Wonder if it's possible to view more tracks at once on a large screen because viewing only 12 tracks seems like a waste of space (if the album is longer than 12 tracks). Maybe it has to do with resolution and scaling of the OS? Seems like it should be able to show a lot more tracks at once!

This image is from an old iTunes version that I found on google but it shows the 2 rows of tracks in album view that is also in the latest version of iTunes: albums-view-100608289-large970.idge.png