http://www.fanfaremag.com/content/view/36373/10237/
Added 4th January
Robert is one of the few label owners to engage listeners on the Internet. It's not the easiest thing to do and some posters have given him a very hard time indeed on a whole range of issues relating to BIS. Most recently he has posted that much of the less-well-known repertoire - he referred to Pulkkis and Leifs in particular - just does not sell. That's bad news in the case of Leifs' Edda, for instance, which requires large forces and is a hybrid SACD to boot. Apparently pre-orders of the new disc of Fitkin piano works are looking pretty grim as well.
One's first impression may be to say we're in a recession, so that's hardly surprising. However, Robert says the recent Gilbert Mahler 9 is doing fantastically well. Ditto the Suzuki Bach series, which Andrew McGregor praised on CD Review last Saturday. Given that (for me at least) BIS's strength has always been its focus on less popular composers - the pioneering Tubin symphonies and the ongoing Aho cycle come to mind - I do wonder whether they will need to concentrate even more on core repertoire just to stay afloat.
With specialist repertoire, particularly with large forces, it seems foolish to me to give it away as cheap downloads. That will never recoup the expenditure but I am sure will detract from the CD sales. I think the whole industry is shooting itself in the foot.
ReplyDeleteLen
I don't think industry is "giving away" cheap downloads. Costs are considerably reduced when there is no physical product to make or distribute. This is rightly passed on to the customer and potentially encourages purchases. I have little doubt that Hyperion or BIS make just as much when you download a full price disc for £7-8 as they would on the CD. The very cheap downloads that are available are mostly out of copyright stuff where there is virtually no expenditure to recoup plus a few "loss leaders" to get people in the habit. Industry knows what it is doing I'm sure.
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