# Streaming Services



## SarahBeth (Mar 27, 2017)

I'm a fan of classical music and the arts. I would like to join a streaming service and wanted to hear from others who've done the same. 

Which services have you enjoyed the most? If you subscribe to several. Please share your experiences. Thank you.


----------



## BlackAdderLXX (Apr 18, 2020)

I don't have any experience with any of them except Amazon music, which I have been using for a couple of weeks now as a part of their 90 day free trial. Other than the app being a little wonky, it has been great. I don't know if it's just that I'm listening to more music due to the lockdown but I don't know that I'm going to be able to live without it anymore. 

Caveat - I know nothing. I'm not an audiophile. I think it's ok to download music to my phone and listen to it from there so I'm probably wrong.


----------



## SanAntone (May 10, 2020)

I use *Spotify* but have in the past subscribed to *Amazon Music Umlimited *and *Apple Music*, all of which are about the same, except since I buy downloads from Amazon it makes sense to use it - but the Prime version is fine.

I've tried *Qobuz* which boasts better audio quality and a focus on classical music but it was too expensive for me, and besides I listen to a lot of music beyond classical. *Naxos Music Library* is really good, but again fairly expensive. However, I gain access to it through a subscription to Early Music America (which costs $75/year, cheaper for students).


----------



## Rogerx (Apr 27, 2018)

https://www.talkclassical.com/23370...ic-services.html?highlight=Streaming+Services

https://www.talkclassical.com/45983...e-classical.html?highlight=Streaming+Services
Just two from the search machine

Go to: Advanced Search


----------



## SarahBeth (Mar 27, 2017)

Thank you for sharing the link. I'm interested in classical music and other arts like theater, opera, ballet, etc. That's why I didn't limit my OP to classical music alone.


----------



## Rogerx (Apr 27, 2018)

SarahBeth said:


> Thank you for sharing the link. I'm interested in classical music and other arts like theater, opera, ballet, etc. That's why I didn't limit my OP to classical music alone.


I think it goes about all types , have a try.


----------



## jegreenwood (Dec 25, 2015)

SarahBeth said:


> Thank you for sharing the link. I'm interested in classical music and other arts like theater, opera, ballet, etc. That's why I didn't limit my OP to classical music alone.


Just to clarify - are you looking for video streaming?


----------



## SarahBeth (Mar 27, 2017)

jegreenwood said:


> Just to clarify - are you looking for video streaming?


Yes. Thank you for clarifying.


----------



## jegreenwood (Dec 25, 2015)

As nobody else piped up, let me tell you that as far as I know, there is no centralized video streaming service like Spotify. But many performing arts groups have their own. In many instances there is a fee to get access, but a number of them have are making them available for free during the pandemic.

I recalled this thread when I got an e-mail, saying that New York City Ballet will be streaming "Diamonds" starting Tuesday evening. For more info, see my post under "Jewels" in the ballet forum.


----------



## SturmischBewegt (May 19, 2020)

*Spotify and classical streaming*

I am also a fan of classical music, a streaming music service user, a horn player since 1983, book cover designer, and a newly minted user experience (UX) designer. My own personal thoughts about classical and streaming are below, but first, I have a favor to ask:

*I need TC's help -- I'm working on a personal UX design project about classical music and streaming and have crafted a short survey on the subject.* I've read through a lot of the streaming-related posts here on TC and it's been incredibly helpful. But getting more systematic answers is going to help the design project much more. The survey takes 7 to 10 minutes and doesn't require your email. And I'm not with some streaming service - it's a student project. I will post all the results once the project is finished, in a few weeks.

*Here's the survey on Google forms.*

Thanks for your help!

*Here's my own personal story about classical and streaming* - before 2005 or whatever I had CDs. Then for a long time, I ripped all my CDs to iTunes. I used iTunes and owned one, then two 160GB iPods (one for classical, one for everything else) for a number of years until Apple stopped supporting or updating iTunes and it became a terrible mess of a program. Now Apple really wants me to use Apple Music, but I very much dislike their interface and just. . . Apple in general now rubs me the wrong way. I still use iTunes at times, but frankly it's really sad -- like driving a horribly maintained Delorean or something.

Recently my wife and I started using Spotify - hello 21st Century! We love Spotify for lots of non-classical things. But I personally have found it frustrating to try to re-create my classical iTunes playlists on Spotify- I have hundreds of horn-related recordings of soloists from Dennis Brain to Barry Tuckwell to Hermann Baumann and dozens of others; I must have a dozen different versions of Mozart's horn concertos alone. I tried to make the same playlists on Spotify as I had "at home" but I gave up. Easier to use my iPods.

The big problem for me comes down to metadata and how it's handled. For me, finding classical music on Spotify is like going to a thrift store where they have big bins of "pants" or "shirts", where those things are, say, different "songs" of some composer/work. You can find a whole bunch of jumbled "songs" when you search for, say, "Mozart horn concerto" but unless you are hyper-specific about what you want, you find yourself awash in poorly labelled selections of "songs".

On the other hand, Spotify has an impressive library, I think. Under-utilized, frankly, considering how they essentially ignore classical music listeners. This is just my perception.

As I was researching a different classical-music-related design project I came across Idagio, which was called "the Spotify of classical", and became intrigued. I thought, "why couldn't _Spotify_ be the Spotify of classical?" Why do I need to pay for several different music services? Why can't they fix their classical search? And as I do more research I am finding out why. Which I'll post back here soon. You can help with this project and I hope you will.


----------

