After two years, Bracketology is back!

What is Bracketology?
Bracketology is a tournament of the 1,024 most acclaimed songs in music history, as ranked here. Songs are seeded by their Acclaimed Music rank and placed in groups of four. In the first round, the winner of each group advances to the second round of 256 songs. Winners from that round move on to the third round of 64 songs. Third-round winners advance to the Sweet 16. In the end, we’ll have a Final Four to figure out the overall winner.

How does it work?
That’s where you come in — you vote! In the first and second rounds, we’re doing eight brackets (32 songs) every week. In each bracket, you must rank the four listed songs from 1 to 4; #1 gets 4 points, #2 gets 3, and so on. At the end of the week, all the points will be totaled up and the song in each bracket with the most points moves on to the next round. So in the first round, there are eight winning songs (out of 32) every week. Voting for each group is open for seven days, and ballots are due at 11:59 PM Pacific time on Saturday of each week.

How can I vote?
You can vote here on the Acclaimed Music forum (look for the appropriate thread), or you can e-mail me at ambrackets09 (at) yahoo (dot) com.

So that's it?
Not quite. Although anyone (yes, anyone!) can vote, for a ballot to be eligible, you must briefly explain your choices. This is important! Ballots with no explanations won't count toward the results.[/b]

Will anyone else see my ballot?
After each week of voting, I will post the results for each bracket, along with each voter's ballots, but without their explanations. I could possibly be persuaded to also include each voter's explanation. Let me know.

So where are the brackets?
The 1,024 songs have been divided into 16 blocs of 64 songs each. Each bloc is named for a famous composer of classical music. The blocs can be found here.

When does this all start?
This starts at 12:01 AM Pacific time on Sunday, July 12, 2009. This forum thread will post links to each week's brackets and the results. You can also go to the bracketology website (found here) for updates and information.

I have a question!
Please post your questions here in this thread, or e-mail me (address found above).



Thanks in advance to everyone who will be taking part. I hope that this goes as well as I expect it will.



A couple of other notes...

* I will be voting, but I will post my ballot to the forum, hopefully to prevent anyone from claiming that I am adjusting the vote tally to my own whims.

* In case of a tie, this will be the method for breaking the tie:
a) The song with more first-place votes will be the winner.
b) If Song A finishes higher on more ballots than Song B, Song A will be the winner.
c) Steps A and B, minus my own vote.

* 2008 songs are not included, as I do not feel comfortable adding them where they might not actually end up.

I see some potential upsets brewing in those brackets.

I wouldn't call them upsets, there are just alot of old songs in the top 1000 that many people on this board wouldn't of heard unless they sought them out.

After a cursory glance I can't help but predict the final four as

Like a Rolling Stone
A Day in the Life
Good Vibrations (or God Only Knows)
Common People

One thing I found real funny was that Layla and Something are in the same round 1 bracket. Battle of the Patti Boyd love songs!

don't know if this has been discussed before and i wasn't around last time so i'm not sure how it worked, but 32 songs/week seems like an awful lot to comment on (not to mention listen to, if necessary), and a hell of a lot more to read. i hope it doesn't discourage anyone (including me!) from participating. so, um, maybe comments optional? those who want to comment and truly have something insightful to say i hope will anyway.

I don't think it's safe to assume all the obvious favorites will get through. Most of the polls we do favor the 'love or hate' music. With the 4-3-2-1 scoring, love or hate songs will lose to the 'everybody likes' songs. It could become wildly unpredictable.

Is there going to be somebody going around culling links to the songs being voted on in a week? Reducing the time it takes to participate will increase participation.

I agree that maybe the 'comment on everything' rule might be too burdensome, but I like the idea behind it because it forces people to put thought into their rankings. Maybe, only require commenting on your #1 choice?

This was one of my big concerns for doing 32 each week: is it too much?

I'm thinking that I'll try it as is for a couple of weeks. If it feels like too much or if I get feedback that it is too much, I'm willing to consider scaling it back in some way(s).

On a personal note, I've already got my ballot for week 1 made up (one of the advantages to being in charge: knowing what's coming up!) and it didn't take me THAT long to do. Granted, I don't have a lot of demands pressing on my time, but hopefully other people will be in the same boat as I am. Besides, each round of voting is open for a week, so you'll have an entire week to listen to the songs, prepare your ballot, etc. And if it's too much to do one week, you're more than welcome to take a break and join back up later.

But like I said, I'm willing to reconsider my current stance.

I would be in favour of 16 songs a week with comments included. 32 songs might pressure people into rushing their comments.

I completely understand the desire to do 16 songs a week. My hesitancy to do that is if we do 16 songs a week, it means that the first round will take 64 weeks (over a year).

The length of the voting might seem a little excessive but I think it would be worth it if it enabled as many people as possible to play a complete or near to complete part in the game.

Speaking of coincidences, when I was putting together the brackets, I wanted to keep a pattern. 1, 512, 513, 1024 was the first bracket. 2, 511, 514, 1023 was the second. 3, 510, 515, 1022 was the third. Etc.

You'd think that with that kind of pattern, there would be at least one bracket that had multiple songs by the same artist. Considering how many Beatles/Stones/Dylan songs there are in the top 1024, I would've figured it would be a big-name artist like that.

Well, there are two brackets that have multiple songs by the same artist. One is the Handel Bloc, Bracket 4, which has two Dolly Parton songs. The other is the Sibelius Bloc, Bracket 10, which has to songs by Sly & the Family Stone. Talk about odd coincidences!

I agree with you, but I'm not sure if I really want to be running this for that length of time. I'm not saying no, but let's just give the 32 a try for a week or two. If it's too much, I could be persuaded to make some changes to the game's format.

Since I have a job requiring overtime and 2 little kids, doing this many comments is going to be nigh-on impossible. I may have to 1-word or 1-phrase mine for the 32-song rounds, or else I won't be able to vote.

And I desperately want to vote!

i don't think i want the first round to go on for over a year either. i think i like the idea of commenting only the #1 choice to lessen the burden.

Here's an idea. Go 8/week for the first round and only require people to comment on their #1 pick.

Then for round of 256 and on, go to 4/week and require a comment on all.

It would sure be helpful - personally,I'm missing at least 150 songs out of the 1024 and there's a few songs I haven't found anywhere to download...

If someone wants to go around and get links to the music, I would certainly appreciate it. I've already got my hands full with everything else. HOWEVER...

I actually do have all 1024 songs and would be willing to share what .mp3s I've got. E-mail me.

Okay, I thought about this for a long time. Considering the large outcry to lessen the load, I feel obligated to help you all out. So here's the new rules regarding commenting your choices.

1. We will still be doing eight brackets (32 songs) per week. I can't justify dropping it to 16 songs a week, as this would mean that the whole Bracketology would take almost 2 years to complete. I don't think I have that kind of stamina.

2. You are not obligated to comment all 32 of the songs. HOWEVER, for your ballot to count, you must comment your number one song. Please let us understand why you chose that particular song as your number one song.

3. I would still prefer that people comment as many songs as they can. That is why I am making a change to the tiebreaker rule. IF there is a tie for first place in a bracket, the following rules shall go into effect.

STEP A: Point totals will be recounted, using only ballots that included comments for all four songs in that bracket.
STEP B: The song with the most first-place votes (of the ballots from STEP A) shall be the winner.
STEP C: If there is STILL not a winner, the song that appears higher on more ballots shall be the winner.

I don't imagine that this will come to this very often, if at all, but I want to have some sort of bonus available for those people who do comment all the songs. My intention is not to punish people who, for whatever reason, do not comment all the songs. I hope no one views it as this.



These rules only apply to the first round. When we get to the second round (and beyond), we will be doing only four brackets (16 songs) per week, and voters will be required to include comments for ALL the songs. If there are any more questions, please contact me at ambrackets (at) yahoo (dot) com or just post a reply to this thread.

It is currently just after 6:00 PM here for me. I will be posting the first week's brackets in roughly six hours. Bracketology will be starting at that time. I'll be making a couple of posts here in the forum at that time, and I'll be updating the site to reflect the current week's brackets. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm heading out to see Brüno tonight. Here's hoping it's just as funny as Borat.