Hi Folks,
One feature I haven’t yet found a use for is Tagging.
Those of you who use this feature extensively, what do you use it for and how does it make navigation more efficient/convenient?
As an aside, 85% of my library is Classical Music.
Thanks a bunch and Happy Holidays!
If you search the forums you will find threads about different tag use. Tags are a way for you to group content. Note I didn’t say Tracks.
One example I can create a tag called Sunday morning, and add a track, or album, or artist, or composer, etc. And then shuffle play that tag.
I use it to make sure my Christmas music is easily identified and to help me hide it when the season is over so it doesn’t come up in search
I also have a collection of ripped SACDs from MoFi, Acoustic Sounds, etc, and I want to be sure I can easily choose those. Tagging is great for this
I use tags for all kinds of personal info about albums, artists, and tracks if a playlist or Focus query is not the right tool. For instance:
Certain topics that are not exactly genres (e.g. albums by other artists that refer to my favorite band somehow)
Friend who recommended an album
Friend to whom I gifted an album
Book where I learned about an album
CD/Vinyl/Box if I have it physically
Special album attributes like limited editions, tour-only releases, autographed
Album covers I like, hate, or that belong to certain topics
Artists that I have seen live, and specific circumstances (e.g. on vacation in NYC, etc)
Some Roon housekeeping info, e.g., tracks of specific favorite artists that are missing the composition attribute in Roon (so that I can clean it up if this ever gets fixed)
I use tags of all kinds also. I could use Focus to achieve the same results, but this is lot quicker for me.
Acoustic Super HiRez
HD Tracks
Billboard Charts
Only Rock’N Roll
Blu Ray 2-Channel
Blu Ray 5.1-Channel
DVD 2-Channel
DVD 5.1-Channel
DSD
FLAC Rips - 24 Bit
WAV Rips - 16 Bit
WAV Rips - 24 Bit
WAV Rips - 32 Bit
–MD
I started tagging groups of albums to overcome deficiencies in the Roon search engine/metadata and to group types of albums together for ease of browsing. Tags are also useful for identifying remastered version where Roon hasn’t done so. As examples, I have tags for the following:
Christmas (albums are added in November, so are easy to tag in one go)
Classical Compilations
Compilations by Decade
Film Music
TV Music
Audiobooks
Radio Comedy
Box Sets &Specific Remasters.
etc
I have a lot of tags, I guess I use them to group random albums or playlists (recommendations, piano, etc) or to subgroup from a group (lets say I use Naxos to group all my albums but I want only some of them and I cannot find the right filter)
Wouldn’t creating a playlist accomplish the same thing?
Yes but I found tags more intuitive and you can transfer them as playlists
But I guess it is up to personal preferences
I would like cool tags 
Different uses of tags here:
NEW: albums added to Library but not played yet
PRE-RELEASE: albums only partly available, future release date
FEMALE SINGER: cause I like female voices
QOBUZ DOWNLOAD - BANDCAMP DOWNLOAD - …. DOWNLOAD: source of album purchase
ALEXANDER: albums my grandson likes to listen to
NEDERLANDS (dutch): language
BELGIAN: belgian bands
CONCERT: not all live albums are concerts
INSTRUMENTAL: instrumental albums
KLARA, MOZART, ABC OF THE BLUES, ….:
used to group Boxset albums
And then some
You can’t add an Artist or a Composer or a Genre to a playlist. Playlists are just tracks (or tracks from albums).
I.e, I can tag the Artist David Bowie and Sting and the Genre Blues. Then when I shuffle the tag it will play music by those artists and that Genre that is in my library.
Maybe a little off-topic but how to create a (dynamic?) Tag containing never played albums / tracks?
Some tips here:
Thx. Creating a Bookmark did the job…
I don’t use tagging extensively, but I have two different tags. One is for local files of which I only have 42 files. I know I could also find them by using Focus and “not Tidal” and “not Qobuz,” but this seems easier once the tags are in place.
My second use is to find album links in my Roon library that exist in Tidal or Qobuz, but not both. When I add an album link, I always use Versions to find the best version in both Tidal and Qobuz and add both. If it doesn’t exist in one or the other, I tag it “No Match” and check all those about every 10 days to see if they have been added in the other service.
I only use the following tags:
DSD 64
DSD 128
DXD 24
FLAC 196
WAV
Torben
thanks, good idea
I use Tags to identify particular affects or moods I’d like to create, like:
Typically I’ll use the tag to quickly find a particular album to play, or simply shuffle the whole thing. I find tags easy to implement, and my family uses Tags most of the time.
I use Playlists to define a static list of content, for example the J.S. Bach cantatas for a particular Sunday, where I will load the playlist and simply hit “play” from the beginning.
I use Genre typically to group (Classical) albums into centuries for more convenient browsing, like so:
I organize these under the Classical genre, of course, and this seems to work well for my use case. My medium sized local library (I think 80k or 90k tracks) is relatively diverse from a chronological perspective (because of my musical training and professional experience), so the customary labels (mediaeval, renaissance, baroque and so forth) are far too broad to be useful.
I have had discussions with people about why I should use the Period tag instead, but my argument against that is that Period is not exposed in the Roon gui (although using Focus and a bookmark is straightforward). And, more importantly when playing the files using other music applications (iTunes on iPhone playing local content for example) Genre is part of the normal gui for search and sorting.
I personally use tags to identify e.g.:
It’s worth noting that I have my library pretty polished (custom genres for each artist, custom ratings for all albums, basic metadata like country or year filled everywhere, …) and use Focus/Bookmarks heavily, therefore only go for tags when there is no other way.
I use tags to group albums from a box set or series, e.g. “Beethoven Sonatas,” “Decca Sound: The Analog Years.”
I do notice a lot of folks here using tags for things that are easily accomplished in other ways, especially through the use of Focus and Bookmarks:
Identifying local library vs Qobuz or Tidal: go to Focus>Storage Locations. For faster access bookmark the locations.
Finding DSD: Focus>Sample Rate or Focus>Bit Depth. Again, bookmark any selection you’d like to revisit with fewer clicks.
The combination of Focus, and then bookmarking the focus selections you’d like to visit frequently, is a powerful tool.