Saturday 26 September 2015

Display lyrics of MP3 files played on an Android device

Unlike iOS, Android OS has no standard music player capable of showing lyrics while the user is listening to songs. There are some paid and even free options in Google Play for downloading lyrics, but what if you are in an area that has no mobile Internet coverage? The answer is to use a player supporting the displaying of lyrics already embedded into the tracks.

Unfortunately, most MP3 files do not have lyrics embedded into them. A simple way to find lyrics for your MP3 collection and embed song texts into the tracks is by using taghycardia, a highly automated program for improving music metadata.

You can download taghycardia here. When the program is run for the first time, a configuration wizard is displayed. For lyrics discovery, select the option Use for general MP3 autotagging / tag diagnostics, or, if you also want the program to get cover images for your albums online, check Use to download cover art for your MP3 library.






When the program's main window is shown, select the folder of the MP3 album you are about to put on your Android device by pressing the three dots button in the top left corner, then press [ Go ]. Alternatively, just drug and drop the folder onto the program's window.
After taghycardia has processed your album, it shows diagnostic information about it. To make the program get song texts for you, locate the line beginning with the word "Lyrics: ", and double click it.




Once the lyrics are downloaded, press [ Update in Tags ] to embed the texts into the music tracks. Simple as that.





Now the album is ready for the uploading to an Android device. One of the best Android apps that support embedded lyrics is called Rocket Player. Download the free version and open the album you have prepared with taghycardia. To enable the lyrics display feature in Rocket Player, tap the three vertical dots menu in the top right corner of the screen, and choose Lyrics, then select Embedded. Of course, one can choose Downloaded, but for this an always-on Internet connection would be needed.





Now you can read the lyrics of the tracks while playing them!



Thursday 24 September 2015

How to make iPhone show lyrics of played songs

The music player in iOS have the capability of showing lyrics of the tracks being listened to. Yet to use the feature, one must embed lyrics into MP3 files before transferring them onto iPhone. This can be done using taghycardia, a highly automated program for fixing music metadata.

Download taghycardia here, then run. In the appearing configuration dialog, choose "general MP3 autotagging/tag diagnostics" or, if you also want the program to fetch cover images for your music collection, "to download cover art for your MP3 library automatically".




Then press the ellipsis button at the top left of the main window to choose the folder of mp3 album you are going to transfer to your iOS device. After that, press [Go] button to process the album.

The program will show its tag diagnosis for the folder. Find the line beginning with the word "Lyrics" in the diagnosis. If it says "NOT present", then double click the line to make program find the lyrics for you automatically.





After the program finds the lyrics, press [Update in Tags] button to write the lyrics into your MP3 files.




Now you are ready to upload the album to your iPhone, iPad, or iPod Touch complete with embedded lyrics.

To display the lyrics of a played song on an iPhone, just tap the cover image of the album you are listening to.