Apple shows Berlin a new way to make a classical record
NewsKirill Gerstein’s new recording of the Rachmaninov second cocnerto and sundry solo pieces has bypassed all known record labels in a partnership that might signal how music is released five years from nnow.
Berlin-based Gerstein performed the concerto with the Berlin Philharmonic and Kirill Petrenko at a Waldbühne open-air concert last June. The orchestra then took the recording in-house for post-production at their uncompromising high standard. Gerstein recorded the solo pieces in the large hallofthe Philharmonie, finally bringing in Apple’s Platoon division to look after marketing and distribution.
The solo pieces are released exclusively on Apple Classical’s streaming app this weekend, to be followed by the concerto on April 28. The release is augmented by a 5,000 word historical reassessment of Rachmaninov’s place in the history of music.
How the recording is monetised remains unclear, but the process is one large step into a very different future, bypassing the established record business. It also overcomes Petrenko’s long-standing aversion to making records and suggests further releases from the Berlin Phil.
Here’s a clip of the concerto, together with one of the solo pieces.
Makes sense. Record companies fleece artists like you cannot imagine with fees just to have the privilege to be on their label to…sell no cds? Make no money?
Good on them. I hope they make a TON of well deserved cash for their artistry!
He has made a number of recordings on the Berlin Philharmonic’s own label starting with Tchaikovsky’s Pathetique and most recently Shostakovich’s 8th, 9th and 10th.
Oh yes, yes, Apple can teach even the Berlin Phil!
But .. can they teach Muti and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra how to make a proper record? I don’t know. The Italo-Chicagoans are convinced that releasing the Signore Muti’s old recordings in Spatial Audio will do the trick and pull listeners in.
It’s like Muti thinking that infusing his interviews with Latin quotes will make him look smart. Or, it’s like Muti becoming complacent with age and assuming we (his observers) don’t grasp why he loves “The Foreste Imbalsamate”.
But we know why you love them Signore Muti, all of them, we know! You have said it so many times! Jungles and tundras alike :-DDDD
There isn’t another way for the CSO to artificially prop up its own sound than messing with sound engineering. And the results still are lacking.
Um so basically an exhaustingly ambitious pianist does a warhorse edited from live performances and then bloviates. This is innovative how exactly ?
I thought the Digital Concert Hall was the outlet for the BPO’s projects. Is this exclusive to Apple a sign of things to come – the dilution (or disappearance) of the DCH?
Petrenko has no objection to recording live. His various BPO BluRay and CD equivalents are proof of this. They’re live unedited occasions.
I don’t see how adding Apple for post production dictates that this will be a new modality for anything. Distribution is already accessible to anyone with a computer. I think the article is full of malarkey. It might be Lebrecht’s fervent hope but it won’t change in house BPO control of its streams and production. Why would the BPO relinquish control of one of the best things that has ever happened to audio/video distribution of orchestral music that we’ve ever had?
So, there’s no physical recording? What happens with those who don’t have an IPhone?
Err – it will work across all devices including Windows PCs, android phones smart speakers. Apple Music is available either on or through all of these. Just no CD and no vinyl.
Apple **Classical** does not work on WIndows PCs at this time. Whether that happens in the future, Apple isn’t saying.
No physical recording. Unplug and it’s gone. All of it. But a few, very old, phonograph shellac discs of Caruso will survive and will be all that is left of classical music after the barbarian hordes have their way. If only we could find a mechanical phonograph somewhere to play them. How I miss electricity!