Style/Artist/Sort Name

Style for sorting artist names

This pages describes how to format the SortName for ArtistNames.

• All SortNames should be in Latin script. For Japanese, Chinese, Greek, etc. ArtisNames this means they have to be transliterated.
• For artist names that are stylised, i.e. ones which include unusual punctuation or spacing which is not intended to be pronounced using the normal rules, change the stylised characters to their equivalent letter and remove any style-only characters and apply the rules below. Examples: "My$t:c DJz" have sort name "Mystic DJz". "*NSync" have sort name "NSync". "t r a n c e [] c o n t r o l" has sort name "trance control".
• SortNames contain all the accented characters that are present in the ArtistName, as long as they're in Latin script. Example: "René Löwe" has sort name "Löwe, René".
• If an ArtistName consists of two or more collaborating artists, each individual name is sorted following the rules below. The 'separator' (e.g. "&", "and" or "with") stays the same. Examples: "Bob Dylan and The Band" have sort name "Dylan, Bob and Band, The". "B.B. King & Eric Clapton" have sort name "King, B.B. & Clapton, Eric". "Bill Haley & His Comets" have sort name "Haley, Bill & His Comets". This rule does not apply for artist names that seem to consist of more than one artist, but do not. Example: sort name for "Hootie & the Blowfish" is the same, because the Blowfish are not are separate band.
• All parts of a sort name are separated by ", " (comma and space). How to distinguishing parts is explained below.
• For artist names that are regular names, the sort name will be "Last Name, First Name". Example: "Eric Clapton" 's sort name is "Clapton, Eric".
• For artist names that are ficticious names, the sort name is the same as the artist name. Examples: "Franz Ferdinand" and "Cypress Hill".
• For artist names that start with "The", that word is treated as is it were a first name of a regular name. Examples: "The Beatles" have sort name "Beatles, The".
• Non-english articles like La, El, Los and Le are treated as the English article The. Example: "Los Lobos" have sort name "Lobos, Los".
• For artist names that start with a title like "Dr.", "DJ" or "MC", that title is treated as is it were a first name of a regular name. Example: "DJ Tiësto" has sort name "Tiësto, DJ".
• For artist names that end with a title like "Jr." or "Sr.", that title is always put at the end of the sort name, preceded by ", ". Example: "Harry Connick, Jr." has sort name "Connick, Harry, Jr.".
• For artist names with a nickname between the first name and last name, the nickname is treated as if it's part of the first name of the artist. Example: "Jean 'Toots' Thielemans" has sort name "Thielemans, Jean 'Toots'".
• For artists whose last names start with an abbreviation, the last names are unabbreviated in the sort name. Example: "Rebecca St. James" has sort name "Saint James, Rebecca".
• Artist names that contain a person's name (usually bands) do not sort as persons, but as ficticious names. Examples: "The Sensational Alex Harvey Band" has sort name "Sensational Alex Harvey Band, The". "The Jimi Hendrix Experience" has sort name "Jimi Hendrix Experience, The".

More examples:

• "A Perfect Circle" has sort name "A Perfect Circle".

Language specific rules

Sort names for non-English artist names are not discussed yet. Please help out.

Icelandic: sort on their first name

Portuguese: Person

• Last name, First name [2nd, 3rd, ...]. Example: "Moreira, Gilberto Passos Gil"
• Specific rules:
  • Compost last name. Example: "Espírito Santo, Pedro"
  • Familiar ship indication names (Filho, Neto, Júnior), go with the last name. Example: "Connick Júnior, Harry"
  • de, da, e before last name. Example: "Hollanda, Francisco Buarque de"

Dutch: ArtistNames with an adjective (is that the right word?): artist "Boudewijn de Groot" to "Groot, de, Boudewijn". This seems to me the most clear and logically correct way to sort these artists. Since "de" is not part of the first name ("De Groot" is the last name), and since we want to sort these persons under "Groot" the best option is "Groot, de, Boudewijn". Better than "Groot, Boudewijn de" where "de" seems to be part of the first name, which it is incorrect.

Discussion

!BibTeX has a pretty complete sorting algorithm and that one defines a "von-part" of the Name, Thus IIRC Manfred Albrecht Freiherr von Richthofen (The 'Red Baron') is sorted: Richthofen, Frieherr von, Manfred Albrecht. I assume that is what you mean by 'adjective'. The correct desciption is either "von-part" or aristocratic title or something like that. I think most sorting practices agree that this is a special part that has to be treated by itself. --DonRedman

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There actually are standardised names for most artists which have been determined by the wise seers at the Library of Congress (and are in the processes of being harmonised with the British Library and other national libraries). These are called "name authority records" and can be conveniently searched online at: http://authorities.loc.gov/

According to them, the official names for the above are: "Muslimgauze (Musician)" and " 'N Sync (Musical group)". (Authorised names are in the "100's" fields, and known alternate names or aliases are found in the "600's" fields.) The others don't seem to have authority records..., yet.

Another scheme that librarians use, primarily for electronic records, is called the Dublin Core. (It's a way of adding information to HTML documents to identify the creator, etc.) I found a site about the Dublin Core which contains a very good description of how people who catalogue things for a living approach unknown names and non-standard characters. There's a PDF document or you can skip directly to an HTML version of page 9 ("Creator") in the Google cache.

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What about an artist called St. Lunatics? I'd say: use the same name as SortName. This could be compared to the band Franz Ferdinand, which also has its ArtistName as SortName. --Zout 

• Just like the notation above about 'Rebecca St. James' uses a sort name unabbreviated 'Saint'. Also stated here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collation#Abbreviations_and_common_words --teleGUISE
  • Rebecca is a person, St. Lunatics is a band. Same argument as for Franz Ferdinand's SortName. --Zout

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Authors: Zout ZeroGravitas