How do I modify what music SIRI thinks I like to hear?

[Howard Brazee]

How do I modify what music SIRI thinks I like to hear? How do I add songs, subtract songs, remove a bad copy of a song so I can add it back again fixed?

 

[IWT]

Hi Howard

This Apple article may get you started:

Use Siri to play music and podcasts

Discover all the ways to use Siri to play the music and podcasts you love to listen to. Find out tips for using Siri, and how to control whatʼs playing throughout your home with just your voice.

support.apple.com

Ian

 

[Howard Brazee]

I know those. I have to tell Siri that I don't like Christmas music and then create playlists that gradually add Christmas music after Thanksgiving because I don't know how to make it realize that Christmas music is seasonal only. But I've had a couple of songs that I like that somehow get on the cloud with gaps, and couldn't figure out how to get my Apple account to reload them.

I remember telling Apple Music my genre likes years ago. I don't want to start over but would like to adjust it to tell SIRI to prioritize a genre more.

 

[Slydude]

I used to launch iTunes from an Automator action that launched iTunes and started playing music. It always seemed to start with the first song in my library. Unfortunately for me the first tracks in the library was from a Christmas album.

I like Christmas music but not in June when the heat index is 100+ here. My limit is Thanksgiving to New Year's. Here's what I did using two smart playlists.I'll give you an idea how I handled the Christmas music issue.

Look at your Christmas music and examine the genre of your Christmas music. Mine typically says "Holiday" for some tracks snd "Gospel" or something similar for other tracks. Make note of whatever iTunes/Music says in the genre field. Now we're ready to get to work.

Create a Smart Playlist With Christmas Music

Fix the multiple Genre problem. If your Christmas music closes multiple genres fix this first. You could change the genre on all the tracks to Christmas but that breaks down if you download a track tagged as something like Gospel. The Smart Playlist won't find it. Here's my fix.
1. Select all of your Christmas music and choose Get Info.
2. Set the Genre to something like Christmas.
3. Here's where these other genres come in. Choose "Get Info" Move to the "Comments" field and add the other genres from the list you made. Add these alternate genres to the comments field separating each genre by a comma. Apply to all selected tracks.
4. Create your Christmas Smart Playlist with the following rules:
a. Genre is Christmas or whatever the dominant genre was in your list\
b. Comments contains Gospel or whatever for one of your alternate genres in the comments list. Repeat this rule for each of the alternate.
5. Allow Live Updating and clear the setting limiting the playlist to 25 tracks.
Save these changes.

Create A Smart Playlist for Non Holiday Music
1. Create a rule where Genre is not Christmas or whatever the dominant genre was.
2.Create a rule where Comments contains one of the alternate genres. Repeat this step for each of the alternate genres.
3. Allow Live Updating and clear the setting limiting the playlist to 25 tracks. Save the settings.

The process varies a little bit depending upon whether you're using iTunes or Music but I think you get the idea.

 

[Howard Brazee]

That works if I tell my HomePod to play playlists (which is what I do after Thanksgiving). But if I just tap my HomePod and it plays music I like, then every time it plays a Christmas song, I have to tell it that I don't like that song.

 

[Slydude]

Ok, that presents an additional complication, but there might still be a solution. I have an idea but I'll have to do some poking around into the HomePod's capabilities. I don't have one personally so I have only the most rudimentary understanding of its capabilities.

 

[Howard Brazee]

When I press the top of my HomePod, it is the same as on any device telling SIRI to "Play Music that I like".

 

[Slydude]

There might be a better way to do this but here's my current thinking.

I know it can understand some shortcuts so I'm wondering if it's possible to use a combination of a shortcut and smart playlists to, in effect. exclude unless the current date is between say November first and January first.

Apparently, there is a way to tell Siri to ignore song selections that your guests make on the Homepod so we might be able to modify that a bit.

 

[pm-r]

I remember telling Apple Music my genre likes years ago. I don't want to start over but would like to adjust it to tell SIRI to prioritize a genre more.

Sorry, I don't know the complete simple answer, but from what I read it seems like the Apple developers left a rather big gaping hole in their music options.

However, a Google search shows that some have figured out various ways of doing more or less what you want to do if any of them would suit your fancy and if you don't mind spending some more time to get it to work:

Google Search

I'm sorry I don't have a simple solution for you, but I also don't do any Apple Music or very little iTunes playback, but I would have thought having a separate smart playlist without the seasonal music in it would work if it was selected to play.




- Patrick
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[Slydude]

That works if I tell my HomePod to play playlists (which is what I do after Thanksgiving). But if I just tap my HomePod and it plays music I like, then every time it plays a Christmas song, I have to tell it that I don't like that song.

I read this right after you posted and missed a possible fix. It may not be exactly what you are looking for but I think it is close. I assume that all of the music in your library is stuff that you either like/tolerate but like me you don't want to hear Christmas music in July.

What do you think if this?
1. Create a Smart Playlist of Non Holiday music as I described in post #4.
2. Name that playlist "Howard's Favorites" or anything else that you like
3. Once the playlist is saved ask Siri to "Play Howard's Favorites" or whatever you called the playlist.

I don't have a HomePod to test with but I did try it with Siri on my phone and it worked with a playlist I had already created. All I had to say was "Hey Siri Play my Blues Playlist.

 

[Howard Brazee]

Yep, that's pretty much what I do. But I'd really, really like it if SIRI was competent. (My wife can't get it to work at all for her)

 

[Slydude]

Yep, that's pretty much what I do. But I'd really, really like it if SIRI was competent. (My wife can't get it to work at all for her)

Mrs. Slydude and I have had our own struggles with Siri from time to time, She rarely uses it. I've had my own battles with it although it behaves better for me.

When Apple added Siri to Macs I decided to put it to the test. I had several incorrectly tagged music files in my library and wanted to fix that. I'd already corrected the ones I was sure of and was left with several I didn't know so I decided to put Siri to the test.

First I had Siri identify a few tracks that I knew just to see if things were working and things went fine. Now it's time to identify the unknown tracks. The first few tracks I tried were identified and I'm feeling good about the process. Then come a few tracks Siri can't identify. OK I expected that. That's when the fun begins.

At some point I get several tracks in a row where SIRi says something to the effect of "I'm sorry I didn't get that". It literally seems to be unable to understand what I want to do. After four or five of these responses I scream into the microphone "That's because you're freakin' stupid"!!

Siri's response, "After all I've done for you" caused Mrs. Slydude to double over in laughter for several minutes.

 

[pm-r]

After four or five of these responses I scream into the microphone "That's because you're freakin' stupid"!!

Siri's response, "After all I've done for you" caused Mrs. Slydude to double over in laughter for several minutes.

And did Siri actually smarten up a bit after that and do what she was supposed to do???





- Patrick
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[Slydude]

Siri has gotten a bit smarter but I haven't tried this with the Mac version in some time. Apple seems to have been somewhat reluctant to open up Siri access to third-party apps/developers but that appears to be changing gradually.

 

[MacInWin]

Sly, one night as I was going to bed, I asked Siri to set an alarm for 3:30 AM as I had a very early event I needed to get to. Siri responded that the 3:30 AM Alarm was set, followed by "Don't wake me up!" My wife cracked up at Siri's response and said, "Me, neither."