# Classical Music Sales by Composer?



## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

What I am thinking about probably does not exist, but you never know until you ask, right?

Does anyone know if there is a source (like Billboard) for Classical Music CD and MP3 sales by Composer?

I think this would be very interesting. If monthly or yearly numbers existed, one could observe the ebb and flow of classical music popularity and trends. Of course, once you have three or four complete sets of Beethoven symphonies one is not likely to buy more, so this list would only roughly approximate what people listen to or find the most admirable. But it would be interesting.


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## Vaneyes (May 11, 2010)

The prospect of recovering such information is bleak. It always has been.

I'm not sure what good Billboard or even industry insider info would do. Unless it's a huge crossover hit, or a New Year's recording from Vienna, it's unlikely you'll even see unit sales for.

The industry as a whole/hole doesn't care about composers.

Labels of course would have all the information, but it's unlikely they would share detail with you. Sometimes you can get snippets of this info by just Googling "classical music sales/statistics".

Online retailers may tell you what their top-sellers are. You may get cross-over material in that data.

Arkiv Music can tell you that also, and what composers have the most recordings.

http://www.arkivmusic.com/classical/NameList?role_wanted=1&featured=1

Wikipedia can tell you who has market share, but that will usually include all types of music.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_industry

A 2010 article noted that classical music sales represented 3.2% of total market sales.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/...-the-final-curtain-for-classical-records.html


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

Vaneyes said:


> The prospect of recovering such information is bleak. It always has been.
> 
> I'm not sure what good Billboard or even industry insider info would do. Unless it's a huge crossover hit, or a New Year's recording from Vienna, it's unlikely you'll even see unit sales for.
> 
> ...


Wow, you are impressively knowledgable about this. You must have tried to gather similar data yourself. I suppose the best proxy for sales data would be who has the most recordings. After all, the labels would not spend money recording a composer if they did not expect a sale.


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## neoshredder (Nov 7, 2011)

Probably a list like this.
1. Beethoven
2. Mozart
3. Bach
4. Vivaldi
5. Chopin
6. Tchaikovsky
7. Debussy
8. Handel
9. Brahms
10. Erik Satie
11. Philip Glass 
Source: Last.fm listeners


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## Vaneyes (May 11, 2010)

Truckload said:


> Wow, you are impressively knowledgable about this. You must have tried to gather similar data yourself. I suppose the best proxy for sales data would be who has the most recordings. After all, the labels would not spend money recording a composer if they did not expect a sale.


Caution, one can twist an ankle or lose money on a leap of logic. One thing you should soon learn, is that logic has no place in classical music recording decisions, and that information can be disinformation.


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## Lenfer (Aug 15, 2011)

There is a "Classical Music Chart" in the *UK* and other countries I know there is one in *France *and *Germany*. I know this is not what you asked for but if you look at what albums are at the top of the chart. It could perhaps give you a rough idea of which composers would make up such a list.

I'm pretty sure the "*Vaneyes* Classical Composer Charts" as I have seen fit to name it would have a pretty narrow selection of composers similar to the list *Neoshredder* posted. Unless *CoAG* was able to clone himself 1000 of times then it would most likely consist solely of *Ligeti*


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