Adieu Andante

I was a big fan of Andante.com and subscribed to it for several years. About a year ago I noticed that the news stories began getting stale and the content old. I even expressed my frustration on this blog a year ago I gave up my subscription some months ago after patiently waiting for its revival.

Now it is gone and I'm sorry. Anne Midgette comments about this in the NY Times but places a more positive spin on the outlook for classical music on the internet.

I still think that time will tell. Andante's business model was never secure and it seemed to me that the potential return never exceeded the investment. It was a high-class operation, with some wonderful content. But I could never quite see how to make it pay. Their record label (featuring top-notch historic reissues) started out initially overpriced, later adjusted, but never had the volume that would seem to help support a venture such as Andante.com was.

Digital downloads certainly have some potential (the NY Philharmonic has just announced such an agreement), but those who have used the BBC Beethoven Symphony experiment as a model for the success of such ventures miss the point. The enormous download numbers perhaps point to possible untapped audiences, but one must remember two things: 1) the downloads were free. Lots of people will take advantage of a free offer, no matter what the product 2) Downloading a symphony does not mean that it was listened to. I have the last 4 symphonies sitting on my desktop, but have only venture to listen to one of them. One day I'll clear off my computer desktop and away will go the symphonies, unheard. I imagine that many downloaded the files, knowing it was free and taking advantage of the offer. But until we can track how many listened to the files and how many times, we have only a fraction of the story.