Like most of the record business, classical music is having a tough time finding a new audience in the digital download world. And in line with the recent moves by record labels to market popular music online, classical music fans in the UK will soon have another bona fide incentive for locating and legally purchasing works via the Internet.Last week, UK Internet service providers Freeserve and Classical.com announced that they have signed a commercial agreement to provide a classical music subscription service on Freeserve's website. The new collaboration has been named Freeserve Classical, and has been set up to offer users on-demand access to Classical.com's catalog of 10,000 classical recordings, as well as an extensive resource of classical music reference material and recommendations.Freeserve says that its visitors will be able to select from a range of subscription packages priced between £3.99 and £10.99 ($6.25–$17.20) per month. The company explains that the "Essentials" package will provide unlimited online listening as well as 10 monthly downloads, or the equivalent of a CD's worth of tracks, that can be kept indefinitely and played on the user's PC, burned to CD, or transferred to a portable player.
In addition to the download service, the companies say, all users of Freeserve Classical will be able to create and store their own playlists and buy them on custom CDs. As an incentive, a free 15-day trial is intended to provide Freeserve customers the opportunity to try out a complete subscription package before giving up their credit card info.As a self-described "world leader" in the business of interactive music services, Classical.com claims that it has acquired a vast catalogue of classical music recordings from leading classical music artists and labels, to which it has full distribution rights. The company also explains that a key to its success is that it has developed a method of providing a flexible music service, allowing the recordings to be distributed legally to subscribers in the form of streaming, downloads, or custom CDs, while still protecting the rights and earnings of performers. Classical.com's Roger Press says, "We provide users an intuitive 'paid for' music service, which gives them a viable and safe alternative to the 'free' peer-to-peer offerings."Freeserve's Jon Gibsy says that he hopes the classical music resource will be "ideal for both classical music enthusiasts and those looking to broaden their musical horizons. This partnership with Classical.com demonstrates our continuing commitment to make Freeserve a destination of choice for music lovers of all tastes." Press adds, "We are particularly excited about this partnership, as it puts our service in front of one of the largest ISP customer bases in the UK."
