According to new research, YouTube content creators are rapidly adopting classical music, with its use reportedly increasing by 90% globally over the past year.
Epidemic Sound, a royalty-free soundtrack provider based in Sweden, found that classical music was the genre used by content creators in 2022 that grew the fastest.
Epidemic called the genre a “creator-led movement” because it saw the fastest annual growth in use in Europe, Latin America, the Middle East, Africa, and the United States.
According to the company, it looked at user-generated content and metadata from YouTube videos that included songs from its collection of over 35,000 music tracks. According to Epidemic, downloads of classical tracks from Epidemics increased by 64 percent year-over-year, demonstrating the growing use of classical music for YouTube content. In addition, Epidemic claims that its classical music has been listened to more than 200 million times on music streaming services.
Cecilia Blomdahl, whose videos show her day-to-day life in Svalbard, the world’s northernmost town located between mainland Norway and the North Pole, said, “The right song is vital in setting the scene.”
Blomdahl continued, The range of emotions offered by classical music is extensive. Depending on the footage, it can be either sad or happy, so the genre matches the mood I want to convey in my videos perfectly.
The popularity of classical artists has also increased. Christoffer Moe Ditlevsen, Trevor Kowalski, Hampus Naeselius, Megan Wofford, and Franz Gordon were identified by Epidemic as five of the most promising newcomers to classical music this year.
Oscar Höglund, the chief executive officer of Epidemic Sound, asserts that classical music “is certainly timeless, but our research shows this genre is particularly relevant right now.”
He continued: We do know that the genre has this singular ability to move people on an emotional level, and storytellers are catching on to that. It’s possible that people are looking for that sense of comfort and escapism. I anticipate an even greater trend toward storytellers incorporating classical music into their content, which presents classical music artists with an opportunity to continue modernizing the genre and appealing to new audiences.
Following the launch of its own high-resolution classical music streaming service, STAGE+, less than a month ago, Deutsche Grammophon, which is owned by Universal Music Group, has received news of the growing popularity of classical music among YouTube creators.
It is called the “latest milestone in classical music’s digital development” by the label.
At the time, Universal Music Central Europe and Deutsche Grammophon Chairman and CEO Frank Briegmann stated, “There is an enormous appetite for great classical music content online.”
Apple, a tech giant, was also interested in the genre because of its potential. Last year, Apple purchased Primephonic, a classical music streaming service with its headquarters in the Netherlands.
Additionally, according to Epidemic’s inaugural Sound of the Internet Report, which was released on Wednesday (December 14), its own music will be heard 1.5 billion times per day on YouTube in 2022.
In addition, Epidemic claims that 2.5 million creator-made videos featuring its 100 most popular tracks of 2022 received more than 20 billion video views this year. Epidemic Sound claims that its videos are watched 11.5 billion times per month on TikTok.