Artist-Work Relationships - Legal Name vs. Performance Name

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I’m sure this has been discussed before, but I can’t find it. Recently I ran across a set of edits that entirely erased pen names from the writing credits of a song. These pen names are standalone MB Artists, linked to a different MB Artist that represents the legal name, as the person performs as many different names and projects.

I assume that if the writing credits in the booklets consistently point at a performance name, then the Artist-Work relationship should use the performance name rather than the legal name? I’m pretty sure this is how most editors do things, but let’s get a sanity check here.


If official original booklets specify pen names for work credits we should use that.
As artist credits (AC) most of the time, not necessarily as another artist (this was necessary before AC existed).

There was probably discussing in the old forum, but here, with a “pen name” #musicbrainz search, I found Is there a preference for legal or performance names in writing and performance credits? which itself links to another previous topic Performance Names and Legal Names in regards to works.

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