Classical music was slow to join the streaming revolution, but the range of recordings available on the likes of Spotify and Apple Music has grown steadily year on year and today a large proportion of the recorded repertoire, including a huge amount of historic material, is accessible. But throughout this expansion, one British company, the fiercely independent Hyperion, with its distinctive back catalogue of outstanding recordings and performances, has been conspicuous in its absence. The label had always resolutely refused to allow its discs to be available on streaming services, insisting that the only model to make business sense was to sell physical CDs or allow them to be brought as digital downloads.
Four months ago, however, Hyperion was acquired by Universal Music and became part of a portfolio of labels that also includes Decca Classics and Deutsche Grammophon, both of which are widely streamed. It seemed only a matter of time before Hyperion would follow its stablemates into the fold, and indeed this week a start has been made on making the whole of the Hyperion catalogue available on all the regular streaming platforms.
