I’ve gotten so tired of the Catalyst re-write of the iTunes/Music player on my M1 MacBook Air falling behind the song that is actually playing, and then stalling out and just quitting, that I’ve been looking for a replacement.
Two apps that will integrate with my iTunes library, and not require a subscription, are Swinsian and Fidelia. Neither of them are new and neither try to be a complete replacement for Apple’s iTunes/Music app. Both offer trial periods from their developer websites.
Swinsian seems not to have been updated for Apple Silicon M1/M2 Macs but has lots of features and looks a lot like the current iTunes/Music stock app, even seeming a bit creaky in its UI in places. It is available from its website
The Fidelia player sounds better to my ears, targets an audiophile audience, and can be purchased from the Mac App Store. I was surprised to find no mention of this app on the MPU forum.
After checking them both out, I went with Fidelia and its tiny iOS companion app for controlling the player from my iPhone.
Fidelia looks cool, and it appears to support downloaded music from Apple Music too!
I have daily paper cuts with Apple Music while streaming, the best alternative I found is Cider. It’s an Electron app, and doesn’t support lossless streaming (Apple restricts third-parties to 256kbps) but at least I can add music to playlists without playback stopping.
Good catch. That was something I did not check out as all my music files live on my Mac’s disk drive. But I imagine it would be important to many others with the popularity of streaming.
I too have given up on Apple’s Music app after being bitten by its idiosyncratic behaviour too many times — I’m currently using Swinsian, which has the virtue of superb library management features, thought the lack of Apple Silicon support is a concern, so I’ll be looking at alternatives once my current library is cleaned up.
I’ll definitely consider Fidelia, as well as Doppler which I looked at before but passed on because it didn’t support Music library import at the time.
I can remember back to when iTunes was a really good music manager and player, it’s sad to see how it has suffered over the years.
(Followup post) Still not happy with the music playback situation on my M1 MacBook Air. I’m finding that the Fidelia music player, which I just purchased, can suffer from brief interruptions in music playback apparently caused by activity in another app. I know that multitasking programming can be a bear but I’ve always been impressed by how smoothly and interruption-free Macs (especially previous Intel-based Macs) have been able to play music. When not being interrupted, I continue to think that Fidelia is the best sounding music app I’ve ever listened to.
(More followup and success this time) Interruptions in music playback really bothered me, so I fired up my old stereo system again. Plugged it into the headphone jack of the Mac. And suddenly, the playback interruptions reported above are gone. So I’m going to blame them on the WiFi connection from my M1 Mac to the HomePod mini I was listening on. Plus the sound from the stereo and its speakers beat the HomePod all to heck. Guess I have to plug in when I’m at my desk.
All right, you got me. I gave up my old stereo in favor of a Sony AirPlay speaker and a bunch of AirPort Express routers and speaker pairs scattered around the house. But I had trouble making that work after getting an M1 Mac. So I sank into the path of least resistance and mounted a HomePod mini in the center of the house and lived the wireless mobile life.
But you’re right, I miss listening to a decent stereo with four speakers. So I’m back to jacking in. (Until I want to pick up the MBA and move around.)
