MusicBrainz Scraper

Search the MusicBrainz open music database. Find artists, releases (albums), and recordings (songs) with genres, tags, countries, dates, and unique identifiers.

What does MusicBrainz Scraper do?

MusicBrainz Scraper queries the MusicBrainz API to search for music entities. Search for artists to get their type, country, active years, and genre tags. Search for releases to find albums with track counts, barcodes, and release dates. Search for recordings to find songs with durations and associated releases.

MusicBrainz is the world's largest open music encyclopedia with data on millions of artists, albums, and recordings contributed by a global community.

Why use MusicBrainz Scraper?

• Open music database — millions of artists, albums, and songs with community-curated data
• Three entity types — search artists, releases, or recordings
• Rich tags — genre tags with vote counts for accurate classification
• Global coverage — music from every country with localized names and aliases
• Unique identifiers — MusicBrainz IDs (MBIDs) for reliable entity linking
• Structured output — clean JSON ready for analysis or integration

Use cases

• Music research — find artist discographies, collaborations, and career timelines
• Data enrichment — add MBIDs, genres, and metadata to music datasets
• Genre analysis — analyze tag distributions and genre trends
• Catalog building — build structured music catalogs with rich metadata
• Content discovery — find recordings and releases matching specific criteria
• Music apps — power search and recommendation features with reliable data

How to search MusicBrainz for music data

1. Go to MusicBrainz Scraper on Apify Store.
2. Add search terms to the Search queries list.
3. Choose an Entity type (Artists, Releases, or Recordings).
4. Click Start and wait for the run to finish.
5. Download your data in JSON, CSV, or Excel format.

Input parameters

Parameter	Type	Required	Default	Description
searchQueries	array	Yes	—	Search terms (e.g., "Radiohead", "Abbey Road")
entityType	string	No	artist	What to search: artist, release, or recording
maxResults	integer	No	25	Max results per query (1–100)

Example input

{
    "searchQueries": ["Radiohead", "Miles Davis"],
    "entityType": "artist",
    "maxResults": 25
}

Output example

Artist output

{
    "mbid": "a74b1b7f-71a5-4011-9441-d0b5e4122711",
    "name": "Radiohead",
    "sortName": "Radiohead",
    "type": "Group",
    "country": "GB",
    "area": "United Kingdom",
    "beginDate": "1991",
    "endDate": "",
    "disambiguation": "",
    "tags": "alternative rock, art rock, rock, british, experimental rock",
    "tagDetails": [
        { "name": "alternative rock", "count": 15 },
        { "name": "art rock", "count": 8 }
    ],
    "aliases": [],
    "score": 100,
    "musicBrainzUrl": "https://musicbrainz.org/artist/a74b1b7f-71a5-4011-9441-d0b5e4122711",
    "searchQuery": "Radiohead",
    "scrapedAt": "2026-03-03T05:47:07.573Z"
}

Recording output

{
    "mbid": "32dcac4e-191c-4e86-a660-e3c9a0c04a60",
    "title": "Bohemian Rhapsody",
    "artistName": "Queen",
    "length": 354000,
    "lengthFormatted": "5:54",
    "firstReleaseDate": "1975-10-31",
    "releases": ["A Night at the Opera"],
    "tags": "rock, classic rock, progressive rock",
    "score": 100,
    "musicBrainzUrl": "https://musicbrainz.org/recording/32dcac4e-...",
    "searchQuery": "Bohemian Rhapsody",
    "scrapedAt": "2026-03-03T05:50:00.000Z"
}

Output fields

Artist fields

Field	Type	Description
mbid	string	MusicBrainz unique identifier
name	string	Artist name
sortName	string	Name for alphabetical sorting
type	string	Entity type (Group, Person, Orchestra, etc.)
country	string	Country code (GB, US, JP, etc.)
area	string	Geographic area name
beginDate	string	Career start date
endDate	string	Career end date (empty if active)
disambiguation	string	Clarifying note for similar names
tags	string	Comma-separated genre/style tags
tagDetails	array	Tags with vote counts
aliases	array	Alternative names and spellings
score	number	Search relevance score (0–100)

Recording fields

Field	Type	Description
mbid	string	MusicBrainz unique identifier
title	string	Recording title
artistName	string	Artist name(s)
length	number	Duration in milliseconds
lengthFormatted	string	Duration as MM:SS
firstReleaseDate	string	Earliest known release date
releases	array	Albums/releases containing this recording
tags	string	Genre/style tags

How much does it cost to scrape MusicBrainz?

MusicBrainz Scraper uses pay-per-event pricing:

Event	Price
Run started	$0.001
Result extracted	$0.001 per entity

Cost examples

Results	Cost
25 artists (1 search)	$0.026
100 recordings (2 searches)	$0.101

API usage

Python

from apify_client import ApifyClient

client = ApifyClient("YOUR_API_TOKEN")

run = client.actor("automation-lab/musicbrainz-scraper").call(
    run_input={
        "searchQueries": ["Radiohead"],
        "entityType": "artist",
        "maxResults": 10
    }
)

for item in client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).iterate_items():
    print(f"{item['name']} ({item['country']}) — {item['tags'][:60]}")

Node.js

import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

const client = new ApifyClient({ token: 'YOUR_API_TOKEN' });

const run = await client.actor('automation-lab/musicbrainz-scraper').call({
    searchQueries: ['Radiohead'],
    entityType: 'artist',
    maxResults: 10,
});

const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
items.forEach(item => {
    console.log(`${item.name} (${item.country}) — ${item.tags.substring(0, 60)}`);
});

Integrations

Connect MusicBrainz Scraper to your workflow with Apify integrations:

• Webhooks — trigger actions when extraction completes
• Google Sheets — export music data to spreadsheets
• Zapier / Make — connect to 5,000+ apps and services
• REST API — call the actor programmatically from any language

Tips and best practices

• MusicBrainz has a 1 request/second rate limit — the actor handles this automatically
• Use MBIDs to link entities across different music services (Spotify, Last.fm, etc.)
• Tags are community-curated with vote counts — higher counts indicate more consensus
• Search for releases to find specific albums; search recordings for individual songs
• The score field (0–100) indicates how well each result matches your query

Use with AI agents via MCP

MusicBrainz Scraper is available as a tool for AI assistants via the Model Context Protocol (MCP).

Setup for Claude Code

$claude mcp add --transport http apify "https://mcp.apify.com"

Setup for Claude Desktop, Cursor, or VS Code

Add this to your MCP config file:

{
    "mcpServers": {
        "apify": {
            "url": "https://mcp.apify.com"
        }
    }
}

Example prompts

• "Search MusicBrainz for albums by 'Radiohead'"
• "Get discography data for this artist"
• "Find all recordings of 'Bohemian Rhapsody' in the MusicBrainz database"

cURL

curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/automation-lab~musicbrainz-scraper/runs?token=YOUR_API_TOKEN" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "searchQueries": ["Radiohead"],
    "entityType": "artist",
    "maxResults": 25
  }'

FAQ

Why do some artists have low tag counts? MusicBrainz tags are community-curated. Less popular or newly added artists may have few or no tags. This does not mean the data is incomplete -- it reflects the community's contribution level for that entity.

The search returns duplicate-looking results. MusicBrainz distinguishes between different entities with the same name using the disambiguation field. For example, there may be multiple artists named "Genesis" -- check the disambiguation, country, and begin/end dates to identify the correct one.

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