Retrieve First Record of Nested Json Array - json

Question

I'm trying to parse the first record in an embedded JSON array and create an object based on a subset of those properties. I have this working, but based on this question, I have to think there is a more elegant/less brittle way of doing this. For a bit more background, this is a result set from a call to the musicbrainz JSON web service, and I am treating the first artists record as the artist I am looking for.
The format of the JSON is like this:
{
"created": "2014-10-08T23:55:54.343Z",
"count": 458,
"offset": 0,
"artists": [{
"id": "83b9cbe7-9857-49e2-ab8e-b57b01038103",
"type": "Group",
"score": "100",
"name": "Pearl Jam",
"sort-name": "Pearl Jam",
"country": "US",
"area": {
"id": "489ce91b-6658-3307-9877-795b68554c98",
"name": "United States",
"sort-name": "United States"
},
"begin-area": {
"id": "10adc6b5-63bf-4b4e-993e-ed83b05c22fc",
"name": "Seattle",
"sort-name": "Seattle"
},
"life-span": {
"begin": "1990",
"ended": null
},
"aliases": [],
"tags": []
},
...
}
Here's the code I have so far. I'd like to be able to use my ArtistCollection type to get around some of the interface{} stuff, but I'm stuck as to how. I also don't want to bother with mapping all of the properties of the artist record, I'm only interested in the "name" and "id" values.
package main
import (
"fmt"
"encoding/json"
)
type Artist struct {
Id string
Name string
}
type ArtistCollection struct {
Artists []Artist
}
func main() {
raw := //json formatted byte array
var topLevel interface{}
err := json.Unmarshal(raw, &topLevel)
if err != nil {
fmt.Println("Uh oh")
} else {
m := topLevel.(map[string]interface{})
//this seems really hacky/brittle, there has to be a better way?
result := (m["artists"].([]interface{})[0]).(map[string]interface{})
artist := new(Artist)
artist.Id = result["id"].(string)
artist.Name = result["name"].(string)
fmt.Println(artist)
}
}
Requisite go playground link

Answer 1

Define a type that matches the structure of the JSON and unmarshal to a value of that type. I use an anonymous type below. Use an array of length one to grab the first artist record:
package main
import (
"encoding/json"
"fmt"
)
type Artist struct {
Id string
Name string
}
func main() {
raw := // JSON formatted byte array
var result struct {
Artists artist
}
err := json.Unmarshal(raw, &result)
if err != nil {
fmt.Println(err)
return
}
fmt.Printf("%#v\n", result.Artists[0])
}
playground