Hi-Rez and Lossless Classical Streaming from Naxos

[christopher3393]

"On Monday January 5, Naxos rings in the New Year with the worldwide launch of their ClassicsOnline HD•LLclassical music streaming and download site. ClassicsOnline HD•LL streams music in both "high-definition"—Naxos' term for high-resolution audio up to 24-bit/192kHz sampling rate—and full CD quality (lossless, or, in Naxos' lingo, LL). The site also sells high-def, lossless, and MP3 downloads in FLAC, ALAC, WAV, AIFF, and 320kbps MP3 formats."

 

Hi-Rez and Lossless Classical Streaming from Naxos | Stereophile.com

 

I'll certainly be exploring this and comparing to Tidal. Cost is $14.99/mo. The site says there is a 14-day free trial available, but I haven't found it yet. Have downloaded with no problem, but only access so far is to mp3 samples.

[rodrigaj]

Interesting. Glad that there is some competition coming to the USA for classical genre.

[tailspn]

wc33 raises an important point in the Stereophile comments artical section; artists payments. As I've noted here previously, the entire (classical) music recording industry is financially based on hard copy distribution of content. That is, a sales average of two to five thousand copies at about $5.00 gross income to the label for each recording. Do the math. From that all production costs must be realized, mechanicals paid, and artist royalties.

 

In the days of ten to fifteen thousand sales per disk, it was a pretty good business. Today, it's break-even at best. If the primary distribution modality becomes streaming, with the current per play payment tenth's of a cent to a few pennies, you'll soon see the end of the for profit (HA!) recorded classical music.

 

Think about it as you're signing up to these new outlets.

[rodrigaj]

wc33 raises an important point in the Stereophile comments artical section; artists payments. As I've noted here previously, the entire (classical) music recording industry is financially based on hard copy distribution of content. That is, a sales average of two to five thousand copies at about $5.00 gross income to the label for each recording. Do the math. From that all production costs must be realized, mechanicals paid, and artist royalties.

 

In the days of ten to fifteen thousand sales per disk, it was a pretty good business. Today, it's break-even at best. If the primary distribution modality becomes streaming, with the current per play payment tenth's of a cent to a few pennies, you'll soon see the end of the for profit (HA!) recorded classical music.

 

Think about it as you're signing up to these new outlets.

 

Are you suggesting that signing up to a classical music streaming service run in part by a classical music label is bad for classical music?

 

I'm not being critical of your posting, BTW. I just want to know what you were implying by the last sentence of your post?

[tailspn]

I'm suggesting that consumers should be knowledgeable about the affects of their purchasing actions, and also recognize the cost structure of producing classical music productions. I've seen very little evidence of that to date with the rush to sign-up for these services, and was recognizing wc33 for his insightful statement on the Stereophile comments.

 

I'm affiliated with a download service site myself, and we'll be offering a streaming service as soon as practical. All download sites will, in order to stay competitive; it's just another delivery modality. The point is, to date, the streaming financial return alone to all but the pop music recording labels, for those comparatively infrequently played pieces (read all), will not allow them to continue in business, let alone record new projects.

 

Their only solution is either 1) for the optical media distribution segment to continue, and grow, added to the income from streaming, or 2) the price of streamed downloads has to become inversely proportional to the number of streamed events, and increase significantly, OR, 3) if you're like a Pentatone, go get Gordon Getty to make a hobby out of your business, and fund you.

 

Any ideas I've missed?

[sdolezalek]

Although I feel that we are making great overall progress in spreading the availability of higher quality and higher resolution streaming, I also feel that most of these services are still not ready for Prime Time. I tried Tidal for two months, but ultimately found that too many of the selections they offered for artists I was interested in were just not very good recordings -- so the higher bitrate streaming was wasted.

 

I signed up to try the Naxos/Classics Online service and although I'm favorably impressed with the number and quality of recording I can access, their software is slow and seems buggy (pop-up windows stay open and cover important aspects of other windows and wont let you close them, tracks seem to get stuck when opening up, the actual bit rate of the streaming varies hugely over the course of an hour (mine ranged from 16 to 1400kbps). Hopefully these things will improve over the next few months -- otherwise I'll drop this subscription as well but hope that someone ultimately gets it right.

 

By comparison, I have found both Pandora and Spotify a delight to use (and therefore wish we could get their useability with the audio quality of a Tidal or a Naxos)...

[Axiom05]

Is the site down already? I am just getting a blank page.

[Boris75]

The site works for me but the prices don't: €36 for high-res versions of Naxos albums, ouch.

[Axiom05]

The site works for me but the prices don't: €36 for high-res versions of Naxos albums, ouch.

 

Agreed, the prices are not encouraging. I thought that more competition translates to better prices? I have found that Presto Classics has better prices for Naxos downloads.

[jiminlogansquare]

Just chiming in here having just discovered this service: (1) excellent sound quality, (2) they appear to have fixed the implementation problems others noted above (i.e., the website and streaming tool work very nicely), and (3) prices are nowhere near the extravagant figures quoted above ($19.99 for HD download, not 36 Euros or anything close to that). I'm subscribing on a 28-day trial basis and will see what I think, but so far am pleased.