primephonic: classical music in the digital age

primephonic
such as Chromecast, you now have the ability
to stream to your hifi system. It’s an incredibly
exciting time to start to serve those audiences
in a way that genuinely is an upgrade to a much
better experience. So for 7digital, and for me
personally, it is a really exciting time.
I worked in the early days of DVD audio
and SACD and I was involved in attempting
to resuscitate the DVD audio format in 2000
when the industry had frankly missed probably
its most obvious opportunity to drive a
new wave of growth by following up on what
had been the most successful consumer package
media format of all time. The music industry
could not organise itself to deliver those
products as an experience, despite the fact
that they had tremendous momentum. And
then at that point the industry stopped for the
best part of a decade investing in audio quality.
We’re now starting to see all the major labels
and independent labels, especially in classical,
gear up to deliver not just the catalogues but
also new releases, contemporary artists and
working in much higher resolution. So over the
next couple of years, there are opportunities
for businesses to evolve which means that music
fans don’t have to compromise on quality or
convenience any more.
If we look at another phenomenon over
the last few years, namely the resurgence of vi-
ii.
experience, search
and discovery
I
think streaming has done a fantastic job at
replacing a lot of our listening habits and has
even improved them. Now we are starting to
see classical music being made available on
various streaming platforms in a way that’s appropriate,
and it’s being made possible because
the record labels in particular have been forced
to look closely at the kinds of metadata that
are necessary to underpin a classical streaming
service. And they are starting to build something
that supports services that are fit for purpose
in terms of search and discovery. But also
we are only now seeing the coming together of
services and devices in a way that makes it possible
for people to access a streaming service
and to listen to music in a quality that I think
most classical aficionados would appreciate. If
you give somebody the convenience and ability
to browse through a catalogue, that’s fine,
but you’ve also got to experience it. The ability
to stream higher quality is thanks to bandwidth
improvements but also because of progress
that’s been made in delivering new formats in
high resolution. That now means that the context
is there and the tools necessary to deliver
really compelling classical music experiences
on the internet are just becoming available.
That’s on the service side. If you combine
this with developments in connected devices,
particularly audio devices and platforms
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