Find the right tag for your song

How do you define dance music?

A walk down the rabbit hole of music genres resulted in the following conclusion: there is no universal definition of where one music genre, subgenre, or mood starts and where the other one ends. Well, at least for the instruments we are good :-) Nonetheless, we all have a common understanding of what each one means. And so have the users of Jamendo.

Learn from the users

The users on Jamendo have searched for music for many years. We have learned from them and have adapted our spotlights to the topics they most search by. Spend some time browsing through the Jamendo Licensing Catalog. Listen to the selections or search directly by the tag you have in mind. Listen to some of the top results and you will get a clearer idea of that tag.

Use the refined search to try combinations of tags. We'd recommend you to do this exercise again after a few months. The tracks in the results will change regularly and we are always looking to refine the search results. So the search results will change over time!

Some examples

Here are some examples to show you how a proper tagging can look like:  

• Filmscore (genre), Trailer (subgenre), Violins (instrument), Piano (instrument), Cinematic(theme&mood) 
• Pop (genre), Dreampop (subgenre), ElectricGuitar (instrument), Uplifting(theme&mood), Happy (theme&mood) 
• Corporate(genre), Synthesizer (instrument), Drums (instrument), Motivational (theme&mood), Energetic (theme&mood) 

Some tips & tricks

Our team recognized some tagging patterns and wanted to share some tips &tricks with you!

• Corporate (genre) - When your track is made for a Corporate video (Catalog), you can add it as a genre. If the track has a “stocky-vibe” (as we call them at Jamendo), it goes in the Corporate category. No need to add other genres or subgenres to your tag's selection! 
• Guitar (instrument) - When you want to add Guitar as an instrument, you can go even further in the detail and indicate if it’s an acoustic or electric one! 
• Musicbed (genre) - This term is used for background music for podcasts. Feel free to use Musicbed if you feel like someone could record a talking segment on top of your track! 
• Chillout (genre) - Chillout is an actual subgenre of Electronic music, it doesn’t mean it is music to chill-out even if it has a chill vibe! If you want to give “chill” as a theme/mood go for Soft, Relaxing, or Calm. Leave Chillout for actual Chillout electronic music! 
• Indie (genre) - Indie is a genre, not only the fact that it was done by an independent artist. For us, an Indie track is a mainstream track that you hear on the radio. Think Alt-J, Coldplay, or the Kooks! 
• Pop (genre) - A Pop track as well can be heard as a mainstream track on the radio. Think Katy Perry or Taylor Swift! 

More info on Tagging

• Tagging on Jamendo - A Guide
• The Importance of Tagging Your Music