How can I detect the BPM (beats per minute) of a song?

Question

For some activities such as running it is important to know how many BPM a song has. I know that Banshee can do this but I couldn't figure out how to do this for a selected range of songs.

Which tool can I use to detect the BPM and immediately tag this in the ID3 fiels of the corresponding files?

Solution 1

bpm-tools are command-line tools for detecting and tagging BPM.

Here's the man page of the package in Ubuntu 14.04 LTS.

You could use a loop or xargs in a shell script to run this on a library of songs.

Solution 2

There is a thread (Any beat detection software for Linux?) on SuperUser dealing with the same problem.

It uses a combination of commands (bpmcount, mid3v2, vorbiscomment, metaflac) compiled into a neat shell script.

Solution 3

Mixxx has a built-in analyser that will let you select a bunch of songs from your library to analyse their BPM.

I recommend using the latest version of Mixxx (1.11 at the time of writing) to make sure you get the most reliable analysis (it has been enhanced recently). You can use their PPA to always have the latest stable version.

However, as mentioned by naught101 in the comments, the value is not yet saved in the file's tags as the development team needs to fix a memory corruption problem before it is enabled. Therefeore, my answer is only partial.

Solution 4

SongKong (pro version) can calculate the BPM of over a million songs as they are matched to MusicBrainz. It updates your iTunes folders in real time.

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Comments

[jrg]

Are you still looking for an answer to this?

[Linh]

Yes, there has not been a decent answer yet

[Linh]

I know, see my question...

[nanofarad]

Can you give an explanation on how to use this software?

[mmx]

Copy the files into your $PATH and run bpm-tag file.mp3

[naught101]

Worth noting that tags are not saved in the files in newer versions of Mixxx. The option is disabled, due to potential data corruption, and Mixxx never saved BPM to files.

[laher]

bpm-tools is now available via apt-get, and you'll also need libsox-fmt-mp3 for mp3s. However, I tried using it with one mp3, and it erased/corrupted the existing tags. So, proceed with caution (I just use the -n option to print it to screen only).

[Jobjörn Folkesson]

I would suggest find /music-folder -name '*.mp3' -exec bpm-tag '{}' for tagging all mp3 files in a library