Is Apple Music Classical the App that Music Lovers Have Been Hoping For?

“For years, classical music fans have been left behind in the streaming revolution,” reports Anastasia Tsioulcas in Monday’s (4/24) National Public Radio. “Finding particular works and recordings has been hit or miss on the major platforms, which were basically built to search for an artist’s name and a song title. Apple Music Classical, launched last month, is the latest streaming service to take a serious swing at the likes of Bach, Beethoven and Bartók…. In my exploration of Apple Music Classical, the app usually gave me the results I sought on the first search attempt. For popular pieces of music, such as Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 5 ‘Emperor’—for which there are 817 (!) recordings available—the app provides a brief text introduction to the work, a human curator-recommended ‘Editor’s Choice’” recording, several ‘popular recordings’ of the piece, and then a list of some related works … If you use an Android phone, you’re still out of luck … Apple Music Classical isn’t available on a desktop…. Can Apple succeed with classical music fans when so many other services have failed? That’s still an open question. But at least one of the biggest players in streaming is finally paying attention.”