SALES BY TYPE OF MUSIC
The Classical Market
PROFILE:
Overall sales down but digital’s share of sales up to 12.9%
The independent label Hyperion celebrated
its 30th anniversary in 2010 and claimed
an improved 1.8% of the Classical albums
market in 2011.
“
The market has been tough” says Sales
and Marketing Manager Mike Spring,
“but highlights for us have included our two
Stephen Hough titles, which were recordings
of Chopin waltzes and Grieg/Liszt piano
concertos. It was the bicentenary of Liszt’s birth
in 2011 and our Hamelin release and the box
set of his complete piano works were also very
popular – the latter sold over five and a half
thousand copies: not bad for a 99-CD set!
We also won a Gramophone award for our
Finley/Drake Benjamin Britten CD. The next
year’s schedule is already filling out nicely, with
quite a few key releases slated for autumn.
Digital is becoming increasingly important
for us – it accounts for 13% of our turnover
now. We launched our own download
service two years ago and as a result we’ve
really been able to tailor and hone our offer.
DIGITAL IS BECOMING INCREASINGLY
IMPORTANT FOR US – IT ACCOUNTS
FOR 13% OF OUR TURNOVER NOW. The classical consumer puts an emphasis on
sound quality, so we offer MP3 VBR, FLAC and
ALAC downloads and find the lossless formats
easily outsell MP3; we will go on to offer studio
master quality in the near future. We’ve yet to
see any real value in the streaming market,
although clearly this is becoming an important
way for people to sample music. We’re trying
different ways to reach out to customers but
one of the big worries for us is the impact that
the closure of bricks and mortar outlets has.
Although the majority of our physical sales are
online, shops put music in front of buyers and
not all those high street customers are going
to migrate over to buying on the internet.
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”
Following a year when sales stabilised in 2010, there was a
double digit drop (of 11%) in the sales of Classical music in
2011 as the market fell to 3.4m units.
Classical Sales and Market Share
Sales (m)
Market Share
2004
5.421
3.4%
Although change in formats and the pattern of retail sales
should be taken into consideration, most of this decline can
be attributed to sales of the best sellers. In 2010 the top two
titles of the year sold more than 700,000 copies compared
to 373,000 in 2011. The difference between the two figures
represented the majority of the overall market decline of
423,000 lost sales.
2005
5.089
3.3%
2006
5.155
3.4%
2007
4.721
3.6%
2008
4.689
3.7%
2009
3.864
3.2%
2010
3.828
3.5%
The rate of growth in sales of digital Classical albums was an
impressive 50%, well ahead of the total market increase but the
volume increase was sufficient to offset only a quarter of the
downturn in Classical CD sales, which fell by more than 16%.
2011
3.415
3.3%
Digital’s share of Classical sales is still failing to match that in the
broader album market but progress is being made – digital
now accounts for 12.9% of sales, and on the most-downloaded
title (Ludovico Einaudi’s Islands) physical took a minority share.
Mid price titles became more important to the market in
2011, rising to take a share of more than 20% and overtaking
the budget sector in the process. Compilations also grew in
significance, claiming 16.3% of sales compared with 13.8%
in 2010.
Compilations
16.3%
CLASSICAL
ARTIST/
COMPILATION
Sales Split
(%)
Artist
83.7%
Source: Official Charts Company
Digital’s Share of Classical Album Sales
(% units)
2006
1.1%
2007
2.6%
2008
3.8%
2009
6.3%
2010
7.7%
2011
12.9%
Source: Official Charts Company
Digital
12.9%
CLASSICAL
ALBUMS
Digital/Physical
Split (%)
Physical
87.1%
CLASSICAL
Best Sellers and Market Share – Classical
Clean sweep for Decca in the year-end chart
The chart for the best selling albums of the year was
dominated by Decca releases, which accounted for all of the
top 10 (including one joint venture with EMI) and 17 of the
top 20. Sales of Andre Rieu albums topped 485,000 in 2011,
and the Dutch violinist and conductor took the number one
spot for the second year in a row (this time with And The
Waltz Goes On), and he remained the best selling Classical
artist overall. Andrea Bocelli’s Concerto was one of three
Classical titles to feature in the year-end overall top 100, the
third being Now That’s What I Call Classical which recorded
an impressive total of in excess of 135,000 copies, more
than twice that of the best selling compilation in 2010.
Universal once again claimed well over half of sales in the
market, although their share dipped slightly from 2010’s
60.4%. EMI recorded a fairly sharp increase thanks in part to
their share of sales of the Now compilation and it was also
a good year for HNH, Hyperion, Delta, Chandos and LSO
who all saw their market shares improve.
3 VARIOUS ARTISTS
Now That’s What I Call Classical
Decca/EMI TV
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
Universal Music
50.4
47.9
54.6
58.0
60.4
56.4
EMI Music
16.4
16.3
11.4
9.2
8.4
13.4
Sony Music
9.7
8.9
12.6
11.9
10.3
6.2
10.0
9.0
7.3
7.2
5.8
6.1
Warner Music
2.6
1.9
1.3
1.8
2.2
3.0
Hyperion
1.1
1.2
1.2
1.5
1.5
1.8
Delta
0.1
-
0.1
0.1
0.2
1.2
Chandos
0.4
0.6
0.7
0.9
0.9
1.1
LSO
0.6
0.6
0.6
0.6
0.6
1.0
Union Square Music
1.0
0.8
1.2
1.5
1.4
0.9
X5
-
-
-
-
0.3
0.9
Harmonia Mundi
0.5
0.6
0.6
0.8
0.9
0.8
Demon Music Group
2.7
4.7
3.0
1.6
1.6
0.7
Coro
-
0.1
0.2
0.3
0.4
0.6
T2 Entertainment
-
-
-
-
0.2
0.5
ECM
0.2
0.2
0.2
0.3
0.5
0.4
Collegium
0.2
0.2
0.4
0.3
0.3
0.3
-
-
-
0.1
0.1
0.3
Foreign Media Group
Source: Official Charts Company
1 ANDRE RIEU & JOHANN
STRAUSS ORCHESTRA
And The Waltz Goes On
Decca
2 ANDREA BOCELLI
Concerto – One Night In Central Park
Decca
Classical Market Share by Record Company (% units)
HNH
TOP 10 CLASSICAL ALBUMS 2011
4 ANDRE RIEU & JOHANN
STRAUSS ORCHESTRA
Moonlight Serenade
Decca
5 BAND OF HM ROYAL MARINES
Summon The Heroes
Decca
6 KATHERINE JENKINS
One Fine Day
Decca
7 MILOS KARADAGLIC
The Guitar
Decca
8 HAYLEY WESTENRA/ENNIO MORRICONE
Paradiso
Decca
9 ANDRE RIEU
Forever Vienna
Decca
10 BAND OF THE COLDSTREAM GUARDS
Pride Of The Nation
Decca
Source: Official Charts Company
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