Just over a year since Apple released its dedicated classical music streaming platform, the media giant has launched a new classical music chart.
The Apple Classical Top 100 draws on data of music streamed and downloaded across its own platforms and services, for a weekly rundown described by Apple as the ‘chart classical music lovers deserve’.
The first top ten sees a range of core repertoire, film, and contemporary classical from a range of international artists, plus crowd-pleasers and compilations, with the Berlin Philharmonic’s Mahler Symphony compilation coming in a surprising number ten. Topping the list is Tianqi Du’s recordings of Bach Keyboard Concertos with the Academy of St Martin in the Fields conducted by Jonathan Bloxham.
The chart combines five data sources from Apple’s own platforms and services spanning 165 countries to ‘form a complete view of what’s happening in classical music’, including Apple Music Classical streams, Apple Music streams, iTunes downloads, iTunes song sales and Shazam tags. The press release continues, “No other classical chart includes all of these sources making Apple Classical Top 100 the most comprehensive and representative chart available.”
Based on a comparison of global subscription figures, a chart based solely on platform usage may not be as representative as claimed. As of Q1 2024, examining the two major music streaming platforms, Apple Music has secured 93 million subscribers worldwide, including access to its Classical platform. In contrast, Spotify leads with 235 million subscribers. Among classical music fans, Spotify isn’t necessarily the go-to platform, with anecdotal evidence suggesting a preference among audiophiles for physical formats like CDs. Despite Spotify’s larger market share, questions arise about the true representation of Apple’s Classical Chart.
Apple Classical launched in March 2023 offering up to 5 million tracks, rich meta-descriptions that surfaced classical music artists, works and recordings, plus a powerful search function. In this way, the user experience was specifically designed to target the needs of classical music lovers, enhanced with a strong editorial that celebrated the genre rather than dumbed down.
The number of sign-ups for Apple Classical since launch have not been disclosed. The criteria for reporting are similarly opaque. What constitutes an album listen? What constitutes a track listen? How many tracks from an album is required? Is streaming weighted more favourably over download? What weighting if any is given to those countries where there is a less penetration of mobile data networks?
There’s also a question as to what impact the Apple Classical app’s user interface drives listens (and so potentially skews results). Additionally, what impact does the app’s algorithm have serving up suggestions tailored to the user? Does the ‘chart that classical music lovers deserve’ holistically reflect the worldwide digital appetite for classical-on-demand or simply illustrate the impact Apple’s interface and algorithm have in driving users to its own content?
In comparison, Spotify’s web app highlights numbers of plays for individual tracks. This comparatively transparent data provides more useful insights (even if it causes a headache for Spotify when artists understandably complain about the pitiful revenue the platform passes on). In masking the criteria and its data is Apple Classical is unwittingly drawing attention to its lack of take up amongst its target consumer-base?
Thoroughly Good is a paid subscriber to Apple Classical
