Daniel Barenboim, legendary conductor and pianist, has launched a new digital-only label in partnership with Universal Music they’re calling Peral Music. Peral Music will be offered in the iTunes Store’s ‘Mastered for iTunes’ format, and the first release will be offered through iTunes with a two-month exclusivity. The deal was announced today in Berlin.
“I came up with the idea for the label,” said Barenboim in a statement, “because I’ve had the good fortune to record for 60 years, and always with major companies. I’ve seen all the developments that the industry has made; my first recordings were on 45s. Then LP, then CD… so I’ve seen a lot of changes. And I’ve also seen the changes to the place of music in society which is, in my view, much weaker than it was, say, 60 years ago.”
The lack of music education, “even in the cradle of music, Austria and Germany, has created a generation who have grown up without music.” Barenboim’s new venture aims to bring great music, and great music-making, to this new generation via digital technology. “I didn’t want to accept such a negative verdict and therefore I wanted to find a way to start something that might get through to the younger generation who are completely at home in the digital world, and might get interested in a project like this that is exclusively for download. It’s a digital label and will not have a CD equivalent.”