vocabulary: name: MusicBrainz Music Metadata Vocabulary description: >- Domain vocabulary for the MusicBrainz music encyclopedia, covering the canonical entity model (artist, release, recording, work, label, place, area, event, instrument, series, URL, genre), industry identifiers (MBID, ISRC, ISWC, DiscID, label code, barcode), relationships, and community contribution concepts (tags, ratings, collections, editor). version: "1.0.0" created: "2026-05-29" modified: "2026-05-29" provider: MusicBrainz domain: Music Metadata / Open Encyclopedia terms: - term: MBID definition: >- MusicBrainz Identifier - a UUID v4 that uniquely and persistently identifies any MusicBrainz entity (artist, release, recording, work, etc.). MBIDs are the canonical primary key across the API. tags: [Identity, Reference] aliases: [MusicBrainz ID, GID] examples: ["5b11f4ce-a62d-471e-81fc-a69a8278c7da"] - term: ISRC definition: >- International Standard Recording Code - a 12-character industry identifier for sound and music-video recordings. MusicBrainz stores multiple ISRCs per recording and exposes a dedicated `/isrc/{isrc}` lookup. tags: [Identifier, Industry Standard] examples: ["USGF19102751"] - term: ISWC definition: >- International Standard Musical Work Code - an industry identifier for musical compositions (works), not recordings. Exposed via `/iswc/{iswc}` lookup. tags: [Identifier, Industry Standard] examples: ["T-101.690.320-9"] - term: DiscID definition: >- A 28-character identifier computed from a CD's table of contents (TOC), used to identify physical audio CDs without needing the CD's metadata. Computed by libdiscid and resolved via `/discid/{discid}`. tags: [Identifier, Physical Media] aliases: [Disc ID, MusicBrainz Disc ID] - term: Barcode definition: >- A UPC/EAN/GTIN code printed on the release packaging, used for retail identification. Stored per-release and submittable via the barcode submission endpoint. tags: [Identifier, Retail] - term: Label Code definition: >- A numeric code assigned by the IFPI to record labels for industry-wide identification. Stored without the "LC" prefix. tags: [Identifier, Industry Standard] - term: ISNI definition: >- International Standard Name Identifier - an ISO standard for uniquely identifying public identities of contributors to creative works. Stored on artists and labels. tags: [Identifier, Industry Standard] - term: IPI definition: >- Interested Parties Information code - a CISAC identifier for songwriters, composers, and publishers. Stored on artists and labels. tags: [Identifier, Rights] - term: Artist definition: >- A person, group, orchestra, choir, character, or other artistic entity. Artists have a type, an optional gender (for persons), an associated area, a life span, and aliases. tags: [Entity, Creator] schema_type: MusicGroup - term: Release definition: >- A specific issue of a release group - a particular pressing, country release, or edition. Releases have packaging, a barcode, a label, a country, a date, language, and media (discs/sides). tags: [Entity, Content] schema_type: MusicAlbum - term: Release Group definition: >- A logical grouping of releases that fans would consider a single album. Holds the primary type (Album, Single, EP, Broadcast, Other), secondary types (Compilation, Live, Soundtrack, etc.), and a first-release date. tags: [Entity, Content] - term: Recording definition: >- A distinct audio capture of a performance. A single recording can appear on many releases as tracks. Carries ISRCs. tags: [Entity, Audio] schema_type: MusicRecording - term: Work definition: >- An abstract musical composition - the song/composition itself, independent of any recording or performance. Carries ISWCs and links to composers, lyricists, and arrangers. tags: [Entity, Composition] schema_type: MusicComposition - term: Track definition: >- A specific appearance of a recording on a release - the per-release ordering, position, number, and title. Tracks are not standalone MBIDs in the same way other entities are. tags: [Entity, Reference] - term: Label definition: >- A record label or imprint - the company responsible for issuing a release. Labels have a country, a label code, a type (Imprint, Production, Distributor, etc.), and a life span. tags: [Entity, Business] schema_type: Organization - term: Place definition: >- A physical location relevant to music - a studio, venue, stadium, or pressing plant. Places have an address, geographic coordinates, and an associated area. tags: [Entity, Location] schema_type: Place - term: Area definition: >- A geographic area - country, subdivision, county, city, district, or island. Areas form a hierarchy and use ISO 3166-1/-2/-3 codes when applicable. tags: [Entity, Geography] schema_type: AdministrativeArea - term: Event definition: >- An organized happening at which artists performed - a concert, festival, launch event, ceremony, or convention. Events have a date/time, a setlist, and link to artists, places, and series. tags: [Entity, Performance] schema_type: Event - term: Instrument definition: >- A musical instrument or family of instruments used in recordings. Instruments have a type (Wind, String, Percussion, Electronic, Family, Ensemble, Other) and a free-text description. tags: [Entity, Equipment] - term: Series definition: >- An ordered grouping of related entities - a tour series, award ceremony series, recording series, release-group series, etc. tags: [Entity, Grouping] - term: URL definition: >- A URL linked to one or more MusicBrainz entities. URLs are first-class entities so the same resource (e.g. an artist's homepage) can be looked up directly via `/url?resource=...`. tags: [Entity, Reference] - term: Genre definition: >- A curated music genre from the MusicBrainz genre taxonomy. Genres are a special tag with an MBID, enumerable via `/genre/all`. tags: [Taxonomy, Classification] - term: Relationship definition: >- A first-class typed link between two MusicBrainz entities (e.g. composer, lyricist, performer, member-of-band, location-of-event, sample-of). Returned via `inc=*-rels` parameters with a direction and optional attributes. tags: [Relation, Graph] aliases: [Relation, AR] - term: Disambiguation definition: >- A short human-readable comment that distinguishes an entity from others with the same name (e.g. "90s US grunge band" for Nirvana). tags: [Metadata, Identity] - term: Artist Credit definition: >- An ordered list of artists with optional join phrases that produces a single human-readable attribution string (e.g. "Jay-Z feat. Linkin Park"). Used on releases, recordings, tracks, and release groups. tags: [Attribution, Credit] - term: Tag definition: >- A community folksonomy term applied to any entity. Tags have an aggregate count from upvotes and can be filtered by user. Submittable via the `/tag` endpoint while authenticated. tags: [Community, Folksonomy] - term: Rating definition: >- A community 1-5 star aggregate score on any entity, plus a vote count. Per-user ratings are available to authenticated callers via `inc=user-ratings`. tags: [Community, Quality] - term: Collection definition: >- A personal or shared list of MusicBrainz entities owned by an editor. Collections are typed (release collection, work collection, etc.) and can be managed via PUT/DELETE. tags: [User, Curation] - term: Editor definition: >- A registered MusicBrainz user who can submit edits, tags, ratings, and maintain collections. Editors are referenced by username (not MBID) in collection lookups. tags: [User, Contributor] aliases: [User, Contributor] - term: Life Span definition: >- A begin/end date pair plus an `ended` boolean attached to artists, labels, places, and events. Dates may be year, year-month, or full ISO date precision. tags: [Time, Metadata] - term: Cover Art Archive definition: >- The MetaBrainz sister project that stores release artwork, keyed by release MBID. Releases include a `cover-art-archive` block summarizing artwork availability. tags: [Sister Project, Artwork] aliases: [CAA] - term: MMD-2 XML definition: >- The MusicBrainz XML Metadata (MMD) schema, version 2, defined in mmd-schema/mmd-2.0/musicbrainz.rng. The default response format for the Web Service v2. tags: [Format, Schema] - term: Live Data Feed definition: >- Hourly replication packets published to mirrors of the MusicBrainz database so any consumer can keep a local replica in sync with the central database. tags: [Replication, Bulk Data] - term: User-Agent Requirement definition: >- Every Web Service v2 request must include a meaningful User-Agent identifying the application (and ideally a contact). Generic or empty User-Agents are subject to IP blocking. tags: [Policy, Etiquette] - term: Rate Limit definition: >- The MusicBrainz Web Service v2 enforces a strict ceiling of one HTTP request per second per source IP. Exceeding it returns HTTP 503 (or 429 on some mirrors) with a Retry-After hint. tags: [Policy, Throttling] - term: NGS definition: >- Next-Generation Schema - the redesigned MusicBrainz database introduced in 2011 that established the release/release-group/recording/work split used by the current API. tags: [Schema, History] classifications: core_entities: - artist - release - release-group - recording - work - label - place - area - event - instrument - series - url - genre artist_types: - Person - Group - Orchestra - Choir - Character - Other release_statuses: - Official - Promotion - Bootleg - Pseudo-Release - Withdrawn - Cancelled primary_release_group_types: - Album - Single - EP - Broadcast - Other secondary_release_group_types: - Compilation - Soundtrack - Spokenword - Interview - Audiobook - Audio drama - Live - Remix - DJ-mix - Mixtape/Street - Demo - Field recording identifiers: - MBID - ISRC - ISWC - DiscID - Barcode - Label Code - ISNI - IPI - ASIN authentication: - HTTPBasic - OAuth2 response_formats: - xml - json - txt