noob- DeaDBeef initial setup

[Johnmhopkins57]

Ok, Zorin OS 17.1LTS (Ubuntu 22.04)
Currently using fre:ac 1.1.7 to rip CD collection as .flac files to:
john/home/music "albumartist - album/track - artist - title" (pretty much default);
Each album in "john/home/music" is stored as an individual folder (i.e. not grouped by artist)
How to:

1. Add my music collection of albums (as folders), grouped by artist,
   vs. the entire music collection as one folder?
   "Drag and drop"?

will DeaDBeef group them automatically?
Or,
Do I create an individual (artist) folder to drag the "album" folders for that artist?
(i.e. create a folder "AC/DC", then drag all AC/DC albums to that folder)

Also, adding album art?
OR, use DeaDBeef for ripping CDs as .flac? (i.e. "File" > "add Audio CD")

The process I used to install 1.9.6 (AFAIK):

sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:spvkgn/deadbeef -y
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:spvkgn/deadbeef-devel -y

sudo apt update

sudo apt install deadbeef

sudo apt install deadbeef-plugins-dev

thanks,
john