Classical Notes: March 28, 2006 Archive

The classical new wav.

Posted at 1:47 PM on March 28, 2006 by Don Lee

In posts earlier this month, Bob Christiansen, John Zech and I listed some reasons we haven’t caught up with the iPod generation. Now it appears we’re trailing behind lots of our peers in the graying classical music audience—more than I would have guessed.

Stories just published in the U.K. (The Guardian; The Scotsman) indicate that classical music lovers make up a pretty significant slice of the download market. They account for 2-4% of CD sales, but their share of downloading activity is three times larger.

But I’m jumping to conclusions about who these people are. Could it be a younger audience that’s downloading all that Beethoven?