In classical music, what should be considered to be a 'movement'?

[hiccup]

This is a question for MusicBee users with some understanding of, and interest in classical music.
(But it probably also has relevance to rock-opera's and other constructions of musical works.)

The discussion on tagging classical music (not only within MusicBee, but also at other software and websites) seems to focus on (and limits itself to) the additional tagging fields 'work' and 'movement'.

For a lot of classical music that is perfectly adequate. For example most symphonies are constructed that way.
But e.g. for opera this will not always cover the structure of the whole work.

Let's take a couple of tracks from a release of Purcell's "Dido and Aeneas" as an example:

01 - Dido and Aeneas, Overture

The First Act
02 - Dido and Aeneas, Act I, Scene: The Palace: "Shake the cloud from off your brow" (Belinda)
03 - Dido and Aeneas, Act I, Scene: The Palace: Chorus "Banish sorrow, banish care"
04 - Dido and Aeneas, Act I, Scene: The Palace: "Ah! Belinda, I am pressed with torment" (Dido)
05 - Dido and Aeneas, Act I, Scene: The Palace: "Grief increases by concealing" (Belinda, Dido)
06 - Dido and Aeneas, Act I, Scene: The Palace: Chorus "When monarchs unite, how happy their state"
07 - Dido and Aeneas, Act I, Scene: The Palace: "Whence could so much virtue spring?" (Belinda, Dido)
08 - Dido and Aeneas, Act I, Scene: The Palace: Chorus "Fear no danger to ensue" (Belinda, Second Woman)
09 - Dido and Aeneas, Act I, Scene: The Palace: "See, your royal guest appears" (Aeneas, Belinda, Dido)
10 - Dido and Aeneas, Act I, Scene: The Palace: Chorus "Cupid only throws the dart"
11 - Dido and Aeneas, Act I, Scene: The Palace: "If not for mine, for empire's sake" (Aeneas, Belinda)
12 - Dido and Aeneas, Act I, Scene: The Palace: Chorus "To the hills and the vales"
13 - Dido and Aeneas, Act I, Scene: The Palace: The Triumphing Dance

The Second Act
14 - Dido and Aeneas, Act II, Scene I: The Cave: "Wayward sisters, you that fright" (Sorceress) / Chorus "Harm's our delight"
15 - Dido and Aeneas, Act II, Scene I: The Cave: "The Queen of Carthage, whom we hate" (Sorceress) / Chorus "Ho Ho Ho!"
16 - Dido and Aeneas, Act II, Scene I: The Cave: "Ruined ere the set of sun?" (Sorceress, Two Witches) / Chorus "Ho Ho Ho!"
17 - Dido and Aeneas, Act II, Scene I: The Cave: "But ere we this perform" (Two Witches)
18 - Dido and Aeneas, Act II, Scene I: The Cave: Chorus "In our deep vaulted cell"
19 - Dido and Aeneas, Act II, Scene I: The Cave: Echo Dance of Furies
20 - Dido and Aeneas, Act II, Scene II: The Grove: Ritornelle
21 - Dido and Aeneas, Act II, Scene II: The Grove: Chorus "Thanks to these lonesome vales" (Belinda)
22 - Dido and Aeneas, Act II, Scene II: The Grove: "Oft she visits this lone mountain" (Second Woman)
23 - Dido and Aeneas, Act II, Scene II: The Grove: "Behold, upon my bending spear" (Aeneas, Dido)
24 - Dido and Aeneas, Act II, Scene II: The Grove: Chorus "Haste, haste to town" (Belinda)
25 - Dido and Aeneas, Act II, Scene II: The Grove: "Stay, Prince, and hear great Jove's command" (Aeneas, Spirit)


I am struggling a bit to decide on how this could be handled best in relation to decide on what the 'movements' are here exactly.

It is clear that "Dido and Aeneas" is the 'Work'.

But what are the movements?
From this example, are there:

3 movements:
   1. Overture
   2. The First Act
   3. The Second Act

4 movements:
   1. Overture
   2. The First Act: Act I, Scene: The Palace
   3. The First Act: Act II, Scene I: The Cave
   4. The First Act: Act II, Scene II: The Grove

25 movements
   (every track is a movement)


There might be different answers and opinions, depending on what would be 'musicology correct', or what would be most useful in relation to a digital music manager such as MusicBee.
Perhaps an additional 'part' or 'piece' tag could solve a lot, but that is probably not a realistic option for most of us, so I am curious what would be a smart and useful way to approach this?

[Bee-liever]

25 movements
   (every track is a movement)

Don't know if it's correct or not (and I don't really care    ) but that's how I have my operas, ballets, oratorios,etc arranged.  Grouped together by Act and Scene.

[hiccup]

Don't know if it's correct or not (and I don't really care    ) but that's how I have my operas, ballets, oratorios,etc arranged.  Grouped together by Act and Scene.

Interesting. What is your 'method' for grouping Acts and Scenes?

(and, do I sense a 'Deutsche Grammophon' skin coming  up? ;-)
perhaps better not, their yellow is kinda ugly)

[Bee-liever]

Interesting. What is your 'method' for grouping Acts and Scenes?

I use the set-subtitle tag (TSST) and the sub-grouping header

[hiccup]

I realize I just fooled myself, (wishful) thinking that the new 'work' and 'movement' features would solve all challenges concerning handling and grouping of 'movements', 'acts', 'parts'. etc.
I already knew that for e.g. the Matthäus-Passion there are releases that have that work cut-up in 15 tracks, while other (most) releases have it divided over 60+ tracks.
So as you do too, you will still need to have your own additional system if you want to have control over acts, parts. etc. with some consistency.


B.t.w.:
Looking at MusicBrainz, some tracks from classical works have a remark called 'part of':



That surely is some kind of grouping.
Is that something that should be taken into account and could be useful for the development in relation to classical music in MusicBee that is currently going on?
Is it perhaps MusicBrainz equivalent of set-subtitle?
Does Picard use that?

[psychoadept]

B.t.w.:
Looking at MusicBrainz, some tracks from classical works have a remark called 'part of':
That surely is some kind of grouping.
Is that something that should be taken into account and could be useful for the development in relation to classical music in MusicBee that is currently going on?
Is it perhaps MusicBrainz equivalent of set-subtitle?
Does Picard use that?

I believe Picard will import composer/lyricist/librettist/writer, but not any of the other work-based relationships.  So you would have to get that information manually via the web interface.

[hiccup]

Thanks. So as far as you know, there is no consideration/discussion/intention in the Picard department of MetaBrainz to use that available 'part of:' information for tagging files with Picard?

[psychoadept]

Thanks. So as far as you know, there is no consideration/discussion/intention in the Picard department of MetaBrainz to use that available 'part of:' information for tagging files with Picard?

Not that I can see.  I tried searching the tickets for Picard, but didn't find anything.  Doesn't mean it's not there, though. 

[hiccup]

Not that I can see.  I tried searching the tickets for Picard, but didn't find anything.  Doesn't mean it's not there, though.  

Yes, I did some searching first too, but couldn't find discussions on this "part of:"
But I would think it was indeed invented for the sake of grouping acts. scenes, etc,

I am not sure if my assumption that 'set-subtitle' could be used for this is a supported concept.
Looking at Picard's tag mapping, 'set-subtitle' is referenced to as 'disc subtitle'.
That suggests that it's to be used more as some info on the commercial release, than as info on the musical composition.

I did come across a thread on 'work' and further divisions or groupings. Another approach is suggested there, but it looks like that discussion came to a halt:
https://community.metabrainz.org/t/how-to-explain-works/89790/6

[hiccup]

haha, I just found this description of 'movement' on Wikipedia:
"A movement is a section, "a major structural unit perceived as the result of the coincidence of relatively large numbers of structural phenomena."
Read that a couple of times and then explain it to somebody the next day...

I also found this, and this seems more helpful in bringing some understanding on this matter:

Movement.
This is a specifically designated part of a long work like a symphony, a concerto, a string quartet, etc. (The term is not used for sections within an opera.)

Act, scene.
In opera, operetta, and musical theater, an act is a major section of the work ("The third act of Rigoletto includes the famous Quartet"); usually, an intermission takes place between acts. Acts may be subdivided into scenes.

Section, passage.
These terms are useful for referring to parts of a composition shorter than a movement or (in musical drama) shorter than an act, scene, aria, duet, ensemble, etc.


So, it seems that the term 'movement' for the current implementation of extending tag frames for classical music should not be taken literal or to be musically correct (at least not for opera), but it should be taken as a general description for a more general purpose.

[theta_wave]

Just chiming in with my non-educated opinion.  For me, I agree with Bee-liever and organize my classical works similarly:

Dido and Aeneas, Z.626: Act I, Scene: The Palace: Chorus "Banish sorrow, banish care"

Work: Dido and Aeneas, Z.626
Movement: Act I, Scene: The Palace: Chorus "Banish sorrow, banish care"

[hiccup]

Looking good.
Here's where I'm at at this moment. 'Popular' and 'classical' nicely together:

[theta_wave]

Looking good.
Here's where I'm at at this moment. 'Popular' and 'classical' nicely together:

That's really nice.  I imagine that you have it where if the genre or tag is not "classical", then the subtitle is null, else the subtitle is work.  I tried something like this last year and I remember that the null subtitle still showed up as a blank line.  I haven't tried it since because I don't really mix my classical music and popular music in the same playlist.  If it happens for a composer playlist (classical albums together with soundtracks), I just replace the track on the soundtrack with one that conforms close to what's shown on imslp.org

[hiccup]

"I imagine that you have it where if the genre or tag is not "classical", then the subtitle is null, else the subtitle is work."
"I haven't tried it since because I don't really mix my classical music and popular music in the same playlist."

I don't have it selecting by 'if genre is classical', but by "if movement tag is present". That way it will also work for jazz or rock pieces that have some 'movement' structure. And also, not every classical album contains works. Some compilation albums may have only some excerpts of works on them. So 'movement' is not activated for those.

Indeed I also don't often mix pop/classical in playlists, but another advantage of this layout working nicely for both classical and pop, is that I can use mostly the same layout for those two.
I can use filters for pop or classical, and the layout will stay exactly the same. That's easy to get accustomed to.