¶ Lauds: Michael Jackson’s Thriller is being reissued — not something that you would expect to read about here. But LXIV sent me the link to a story from Soul Tracks that’s full of interesting numbers. In 1984, Thriller sold 27 million “units” (LPs, tapes, and perhaps even a few CDs). The most recent big-seller sold only 4. The pop market has fractured into splinters.  

What this means for classical music recordings…

Oremus…

§ Lauds. … is that they don’t have to live up to 27 million anymore. And so far as I can tell, people interested in classical music still have the habit of buying CDs. While pop music is relatively transitory, with most of what’s hot today being forgot tomorrow, classics are like the books that you want to buy and hold even if you’ve got a Kindle. Indeed, we speak of libraries of classical recordings (and of jazz, too, but then jazz is really a kind of classical pop).

Even though I’m madly copying as much of my big-considering-I-paid-for-all-of-it classical library onto the computer for replay on my collection of Nanos, I have no intention of losing the CDs.

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