Last Updated on September 1, 2020
I’m a massive music fan with a large collection of CDs consisting mostly of classical, country, blues, and pop. Streaming services fills in for other music genres, so I basically dabble with a wide range of music. Linux is blessed with a mouthwatering array of excellent open source music players. But I’m always on the look out for fresh, eclectic, and innovative music players.
Strawberry is an audio player and music collection organizer. It was originally forked from Clementine. The main goal was to create a player for playing local music files that looked a bit more like Amarok with advanced soundcard options. The music player is designed for music collectors, audio enthusiasts and audiophiles. The name is inspired by the band Strawbs.
Strawberry saw its first release in April 2018, whereas Clementine hasn’t seen a formal release in a few years, but it’s still in development. I’ve been following the development of Strawberry with earnest, but until recently there was an important feature missing from this music player. That’s scrobbling. To “scrobble” a song means that when you listen to it, the name of the song is sent to a web site (such as Last.fm) and added to your music profile. Strawberry’s latest build offers support for Last.fm, Libre.fm, and Listenbrainz.
Strawberry is written in C++ and Qt 5.
Installation
Compiling software is all part of the learning experience of Linux.
Compiling the latest source code involves typing the following commands at a shell.
$ mkdir strawberry-build
$ cd strawberry-build
$ cmake ../strawberry
$ make -j4
$ sudo make install
The compilation proceeded without a hitch on Manjaro. However, with a fresh installation of Ubuntu 18.10, matters weren’t nearly as straightforward. I was missing git, cmake, pkg-config, glib-2.0, as well as a ton of development packages. Even after installing the missing dependencies, the source code didn’t compile, exiting with the following error.
make[1]: *** [CMakeFiles/Makefile2:629: ext/libstrawberry-tagreader/CMakeFiles/libstrawberry-tagreader.dir/all] Error 2
make: *** [Makefile:130: all] Error 2
The regular Ubuntu package also didn’t install complaining of several libraries being missing including libcdio17. As time was pressing, I installed the 0.4.2 release on Ubuntu from the developer’s buildbot service instead of investigating the issues. Cut me some slack!
If you have any issues in compiling the source code, or you run a distribution without a package, the developer provides an AppImage which makes it easy to run the software. AppImage is a format for distributing portable software on Linux without needing superuser permissions to install the application. All that’s required is to download the AppImage, and make the file executable by typing:
Next page: Page 2 – In Operation
Pages in this article:
Page 1 – Introduction / Installation
Page 2 – In Operation
Page 3 – Other Features
Page 4 – Summary
Thanks for the great review!
Thanks for writing Strawberry!
This player is fantastic!! I always liked Clementine until alsa was removed from the last version. Now i can get bit perfect audio to my external DAC. Thank you for the great review.
I used Clementine for many years but its development became stagnant. Strawberry has been my music player of choice for a while now.
I used to use Strawberry, but fooyin is my current choice.
Hi Luke. Cheers, I just might check out fooyin.
There’s now a Flatpak. 🙂
I have been using Linux Mint since 2014, and I’ve used lots of music players. Some are good but let down, for my needs, by the absence of gapless playback.
I used to use Tauon, more recently Quod Libet and now Strawberry. Both of these latter players share a particularly useful feature for me; they can be used in browser mode (“Files” in Strawberry) so it isn’t necessary so load up a music library. Navigation is easy directly via the file system, and it isn’t as sensitive to tagging, which was somewhat inconvenient in Clementine and then Strawberry, but in browser mode then it works just fine.
Also for my use, it has the edge on Quod Libet with a modern, stylish interface, and as another reviewer has mentioned a few years ago, it can be configured for bit-perfect ALSA output for the best sound quality. My background picture for the playlist is a reel-to-reel tape deck, just a personal touch of nostalgia!
I also occasionally use QMMP, it too can be configured for bit-perfect playback, but just recently I keep coming back to Strawberry; with the stylish interface and sound quality, I sit and listen with a grin on my face. As a bonus, I must say that my air guitar never sounded better!
Have you tried fooyin, Tony?
Hi Luke;
I read about Fooyin a little while ago, it doesn’t appear to be in the repositories (Mint 22.2 at that time, same in 22.3 now). It’s available via Flathub, but I don’t like to use that method, as opinion seems strongly divided between Linux users, some say it’s a great way to install the most up-to-date software versions, others seem to have many complaints about software failing to function properly. So I just use the standard repositories. Pity really, as Fooyin seems to be held in high regard.
Hi Tony
Personally I compile fooyin as it’s straightforward but I have tested the Flatpak which works well. My only complaints about Flatpaks are that they often use up more disk space and can have issues with permissions (but the latter is easily solved with Flatseal).
Given your original comments, fooyin just sprung to mind as a music player that might appeal. It has a super directory browser mode, it supports gapless playback, and is highly customizable.
Hi Luke;
Maybe I’ll give fooyin a try sometime, now that you have put the idea in my mind again, there’s a possibility that I’ll suddenly decide to go for it. That’s how things often work for me! Especially as I have never compiled software (although I have read online instructions of how to do so), so learning that could open the door to other software (not just music players) which I haven’t used because they aren’t in the repositories.
In any case,Thank You for taking the time to reply, another example of how Linux operating systems are backed up by a knowledgeable user community, you just can’t go wrong!
If you decide to give fooyin a go, let me know and I can help with any installation issues.