If you’re a big fan of Chopin, Bach, Tchaikovsky and more, you’ll be pleased to hear that Apple has launched Apple Music Classical, their brand new standalone music streaming app for dedicated classical music lovers. You will of course still need to be subscribed to Apple Music, but if you are, you can use Apple Music Classical to find any recording in what Apple is calling the world’s largest classical music catalog with fully optimised search.
Apple says that the Apple Music Classical catalog is home to over 5 million tracks, ranging from popular recordings to even the most niche and forgotten tracks of yesteryear. If you don’t know where to even begin with classical music, there’s also a hand-picked Editor’s Choice curation list that should be a nice place to start. There’s even audio guides that blend in expert commentary and selected works to introduce the world of classical music to novices. With so many recordings of famous songs around, Apple Music Classical also offers you an easy way to look for, compare and contrast the various recordings of popular classical tracks. You’ll even find thousands of exclusive albums and recordings by some of the most well known orchestras around.
On top of that, Apple Music Classical brings with it a revamped search tool that Cupertino claims is able to instantly deliver to you exactly what you’re looking for. This is down to how the search function uses combinations of keywords ranging from composer and work to opus number, artist, instrument or even the nickname of a particular work (Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture for instance is actually titled The Year 1812, Solumn Overture, Op. 49).
However, perhaps the most noticeable change Apple Music Classical offers over the regular music streaming app is the revamped and redesigned interface. According to Apple, the Apple Music Classical interface allows listeners to easily know who and what they’re listing to with all the necessary information laid out on the screen. This includes the work name, orchestra, conductor, contributing artists and the year of recording too.
You’ll also be able to add not just the regular selections of albums, tracks, playlists and artists to your personal library, but also works according to composers and specific recordings. The Browse tab meanwhile now lets you easily look through the catalog, letting you explore by searching via filters such as composers, instruments, periods, conductors and more.
Other notable features in Apple Music Classical include brand new artwork with hundreds of playlist covers and special, high-resolution digital portraits for many of the famous composers you’re listening to. Apple has commissioned them from a diverse group of artists and each portrait takes into account the colour palettes and artistic references from the relevant time period.
You’ll also find exclusive new content from some of the most famous classical institutions in the world such as the Carnegie Hall, Berlin Philharmonic, London Symphony Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, Opera national de Paris and more. And of course, you can expect to listen to them all in Hi-Res Lossless mode of up to 24bit/192kHz across the platform. Spatial Audio with Dolby Atmos meanwhile will allow you to listen to works as though you’re sitting right in the middle of a concert all with a 360° soundscape.
Apple Music Classical is already available for download from the Apple App Store everywhere and existing Apple Music subscribers can enjoy it at no extra cost—as long as your iPhone is running iOS 15.4 or later, with Apple Music Classical for Android coming soon.
