[lzlarryli]

The classical collection seems to be small. For example, 24098 out of 658027 (3.7%) pop albums are prime, but only 894 of 171251 (0.5%) classical albums are prime. I expected the other way (wishfully, as a fan of classical music), that older less popular music is cheaper to be made prime for Amazon. Strange.

[kolev]

Isn't the classical also cheaper to license?

[justincormack]

Not sure. The consumers of it are generally wealthier so it has always been a "premium" market, even if smaller. The fact that much of it is out of copyright doesnt mean you dont have to pay performance rights...

[kolev]

Makes sense. I also find myself primarily listening to classical music, and, as a side note, I hate that apps like Shazam, Google, and SoundHound can't recognize most of it.

[ternaryoperator]

It's not just those services and apps, it's pretty much anything that has to do with music.

Try rippig classical CDs and you quickly discover how bad the online music registries are at identifying albums, how bad ripping software is at sorting out composer from artist, etc.

In nearly all aspects of software dealing with music, classical is the odd man out. It's a constant frustration.

[justincormack]

The search is also terrible, eg Spotify does not understand the semantics of composer vs performance, so although it has a lot it is very hard to find.