# Cataloging A Classical Collection In Excel



## realdealblues

I know a few other on here have done this and I myself made up an Excel workbook to keep track of all my CD's a while back, but I'm starting a different new one that will I'm hoping to make a little easier to sort and a little more comprehensive. (ie. looking for all recordings from a specific conductor, etc.) 

I'm just curious what Criteria do you include or would you include if you were making one.

My new one has the following:

Composer
Work or Title
Opus # if Applicable
Conductor
Orchestra or Ensemble
Soloist or Special Performer (Mainly for Concertos or Lieder)
Type of Work (Orchestral, Opera, Concerto, etc)
Date of Recording
Recording Label
Recording Type (Studio or Live)
Notes (Specific notes for myself about the work/recording)

I thought about putting in Period, but you get so many blurred lines with is this personal Romantic or Classical, etc. so I'm not sure about that one.

Anyway, anyone else have any thoughts? Any other fields you would add?


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## jtbell

How about the catalog number (in addition to the label)? That would let you find or group together all the performances on a particular CD.

What do you do about a performance that has multiple soloists, for example a double concerto?


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## Kopachris

I'd probably do about the same, except I'd separate work genre (symphony), work number (6), work title or epithet (Pathetique), movement number (1), movement title or epithet (Adagio - Allegro non troppo), work key, and movement key, type of instrumentation (orchestra, piano/cello, orchestra/violin, etc.), and UPC. I'd also probably store it all in a MySQL or SQLite database with a web interface to make it more flexible (store works in a separate table, reference them in the "master" table which includes filenames*, support lists of items (such as multiple soloists)). Then I'd have to put it all on a server, set it up to rip a CD from the web interface, populating as many fields as possible on its own (could probably use Amazon APIs to get some information using the UPC). Then I'd want to be able to access it anywhere, which means I'd have to try to convince my ISP to give me a static IP address...

If I were to catalog my music, I'd want to go all-out.


*Tables probably defined similarly to:

Movements
-ID
-Corresponding work ID
-Movement number
-Movement title
-Movement key
-Notes***

Works
-ID
-Genre
-Work number
-Work title
-Work key
-Instrumentation
-Opus number
-Composer
-Notes***

Tracks
-ID
-Corresponding disc ID
-Track # on disc
-Movement or work?
-Movement/work ID
-Arranger
-Conductor
-Soloists
-Filename**
-File duration
-Notes***

Discs
-ID
-Corresponding purchase ID
-Disc #
-Disc name
-Artwork filename**
-Notes***

Purchases
-ID (the UPC will serve as the primary key)
-Purchase name (album/collection name)
-Purchase date
-Price
-Purchase location (online, in store, etc.)
-Purchase source (Amazon, Walmart, etc.)
-Record label
-Catalog number
-Recording type
-Date of recording
-Notes***

**upload/ripping routines would securely rename files to prevent directory transversal attacks

***I'd like to separate notes out depending on their scope. I wouldn't, for example, want notes about Karajan's performance popping up on some other recording. Movement notes could be good for lyrics, analysis, etc. - stuff that's useful no matter which recording it is. Purchase notes might be, for example, if I got it on sale, while disc notes might be if the physical disc is scratched or missing.

I could populate the database with works and movements ahead of time, then let the software search the database for keywords from the disc information to pick out work/movement IDs automatically. Could be very cool. Sorry if I got a bit off topic, was just musing to myself.

My collection right now is so small that it's not worth keeping track of.


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## GraemeG

I use a spreadsheet to know what I've got (spread across nearly 600 CDs and 200LPs) but it's more to just make sure I don't buy too many things I already have. Vivaldi concertos, Scarlatti sonatas, that kind of thing. Plus, with all these box sets coming out of what's left of the great Classical recording companies, the same work will now finish up being filed all over the place.
So mine is really a list helping me to find what I've got and where it might be.
As such, it wasn't a comprehensive database. I whittled it down to:
Composer
Work
Soloist/s
Ensemble
Conductor
Format (LP/CD)
Label
Catalogue No (ie the record company's item number)
Recording date (vital with all these bulk issues of old radio broadcasts now hitting the shelves)
Omnibus/Notes.
This last field I just use to indicate if the recording is in the "Celibidache symphonies" box, for example, or the name of any Anthology CDs. On the shelf, CDs are alphabetic by composer - whoever appears first on the spine. But I have a Chandos CD containing Ives 1 and Barber Essays, for example. So in my database, there's no note against the Ives, but against Barber it says "with Ives 1" so I know where to find the CD.

I just format it to make sure it prints on an A4 page in readable form, which I can leave with all the CDs.
CDs take up some space, sure, but compared to the inconvenience of endlessly backing everything up from computer, or worse, having access to music only at the whim of Apple's cloud, dependent on an endless stream of money running from my account to theirs; well, that's not happening, I can tell you!
GG


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## senza sordino

Coincidently, I've just stared to do the same, with similar categories. I was thinking of adding a column that says when the piece was written, this way I can also classify my music chronologically as well as alphabetically. Though some of the music I don't know when it was written, the best I could do for some is plus or minus 10 years.

It'll be a long task, but it will also help me sort out the different soloists for the same piece, i.e. I have several recordings of the Mendelssohn violin concerto. I will also separate different composers on the same cd, which frequently happens, doesn't it? I sometimes forget that there is a second track of a completely different work on the same cd.


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## Vaneyes

I use Excel for CM CDs, and keep it simple. Fields are, Composer, Work, Artist, Label, Price Category, Spars, Year Recorded. 

Composers are listed by date of birth. Works as applicable are listed in orchestral, chamber, instrumental, choral order. Artist includes orchestra, conductor, ensemble, soloist. Price Category is B, MP, FP. Spars AAD, ADD, DDD. Year recorded, not days and months.


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## realdealblues

Thanks for all the thoughts and ideas. I appreciate them and will have to do some thinking.


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## Svelte Silhouette

I'd add AAA, AAD, ADD, DDD as appropriate plus, more importantly, any ratings. I use */**/***/R from the Penguin Guide plus any from The Good CD Guide and/or Gramophone. Also, I'd add a purchase and current cost as this, along with some photographic evidence can be useful 'just in case' as a couple of thousand CDs can cost more than a few quid.

BUT keep it simple, and stored on your 'phone, to avoid duplications when out shopping


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## quack

Thinking? sounds like you need to do some SSADM, plenty of OOAD and extensive use of UML. I'll get the Gant charts!


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## Svelte Silhouette

or simply SDM and maybe an ammanuensis


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## mwd

One very good reason to catalogue a collection is Insurance.

I had a record collector friend whose home was broken into whilst on holiday and his entire collection stolen.

The insurers refused to compensate him for the number of CD's missing, requiring a detalied list of the conemts of the collection. A very difficult task. The outcome was not at all to his satisfaction.

I together with several of his mutual friends started our EXCEL catalogues at this time.

MWD.


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## brotagonist

I use LibreOffice, but the idea is similar.

1. I have a main sheet that lists all of my albums, with column titles, such as:

_Composer/Artist_ (artist in the case of non-classical, or classical albums with more than one composer all by one artist, otherwise I use Various as the Composer/Artist; for ancient music, Anonymous is also a Composer I allow)
_Album Title_ (With classical, this is often a list of the main works on the album)
_Number of Plays_ (I keep track of each time I play the album, so that some don't get left out, or I know which ones to cull)
_Number of Discs in Album_ (usually 1, but there are many doubles, triples and boxed sets, too)
_Genre_ (I condensed mine to Classical, Rock, Jazz and Roots)
_Conductor/Director_
_Performers_ (orchestras, ensembles and soloists, but one could make separate columns for each)
I also have a special column called _Step Play_, where I keep track of the next disc in a set to be played, or the ones not to play, so that I am not forced to listen to an entire set at one time and can still keep track of the played and unplayed discs in the multiple disc album.
There is also a _Disc Plays_ column, which is simply the product of the number of playings of an album and the number of discs in the album (I use this for statistics).

2. Sheet 2: Statistics

First column lists the _Genres_ and a line for All.
Next I have a column called _Collected_, that is subdivided into 4 columns: _# of albums, % of albums, # of discs_ and _% of discs_.
Finally, I have a column called _Listened_, that is subdivided into 3 columns: _% of albums, % of discs_ and _Minutes/Hr_. This is a crude estimate of the amount of time I spend listening to each genre per hour, based on the (% of discs listened to / 60) / 24, and assuming discs of equal length.

The All row (under _Genres_) totals the statistics for each genre, so that I know at a glance how many albums I have, how many actual discs. The other columns total to 100%, unless I made an error.

3. Random Play Sheet:

I have a third data sheet that has three columns: _Composer/Artist, Album Title_ and _Random Order_ (it's just a randomly sorted list of the line numbers from Sheet 1, but omitting the first line that has the column titles). I only include the _Composer_ and _Album Title_ columns so that can determine the album to play in my random playing order without having to constantly flip back to Sheet 1 to find out what is on a certain line number in my database on Sheet 1.


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## mwd

Another consideration is Insurance. 

Some years ago, whilst away on holiday A friend had his significant classical CD collection stolen. 

He knew how many CD's were missing but had no concise record of each one. His insurers demanded a list of the CD's and refused to make an average per CD payment. Only after much correspondence did they relent and then with a most unsatisfactory payment. 

This spured several of us in the same position to make Excel lists of one sort or another.

MWD.


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## senza sordino

I have just finished cataloguing my main collection of complete works of classical music. 
564 pieces, from short overtures to long Mahler symphonies, on about 150 CDs

The median date is 1904, so 282 pieces written after and 282 pieces written before 1904.

The average date of composition is 1889. I'm not sure mathematically the significance of the difference in my case between mean and median. Perhaps if I can make a histogram l'll see some odd distribution, not a bell curve. 

The mode is 1928, I have more pieces written from 1928 than any other year. Bartok String Quartet #4; An American in Paris; Rugby by Honneger; Bolero; Nielsen Clarinet Concerto; Respighi Roman Festivals and a few other lesser pieces. Who would have picked 1928? The year before my grandparents got married. That's my collection.


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