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Warner Music Group To Release Its High-Resolution Music Titles Exclusively In The Super Audio CD Format Beginning Later This Year
(April 1, 2008 – New York, NY) – In response to consumer demand, Warner Music Group will release its high-resolution music titles exclusively in the Super Audio CD format beginning later this year, it was announced today by Edgar Bronfman, Jr., Chairman & CEO, Warner Music Group.
“Warner Music’s move to exclusively release in the SACD format is a strategic decision focused on the long term and the most direct way to give consumers what they want,” said Bronfman, jr. “The window of opportunity for high-resolution music could be missed if format confusion continues to linger. We believe that exclusively distributing in SACD will further the potential for mass market success and ultimately benefit retailers, producers, and most importantly, consumers.”
Warner Music Group will continue to release its titles in standard CD format and SACD. After a short window following their standard CD and SACD releases, all new titles will continue to be released in DVD-Audio until the end of May 2008.
“Warner Music has produced in both high-resolution formats in an effort to provide consumer choice, foster mainstream adoption and drive down hardware prices,” said Jeff Bewkes, President and Chief Executive Officer, Time Warner Inc., the parent company of Warner Bros. Entertainment. “Today’s decision by Warner Music to distribute in a single format comes at the right time and is the best decision both for consumers and Time Warner.”
“A two-format landscape has led to consumer confusion and indifference toward high definition, which has kept the technology from reaching mass adoption and becoming the important revenue stream that it can be for the industry,” said Bronfman, jr. “Consumers have clearly chosen SACD, and we believe that recognizing this preference is the right step in making this great music experience accessible to the widest possible audience. Warner Music has worked very closely with Toshiba and Matsushita in promoting high-resolution media and we have enormous respect for their efforts. We look forward to working with them on other projects in the future.”
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Post by deckerm April 1, 2008 (2 of 21)
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interesting. Is Nonesuch still part of Warner? Would love to hear the Robert Goode Beethoven set.
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The Seventh Taylor said:
Warner Music Group To Release Its High-Resolution Music Titles Exclusively In The Super Audio CD Format Beginning Later This Year
(April 1, 2008 – New York, NY) – In response to consumer demand, Warner Music Group will release its high-resolution music titles exclusively in the Super Audio CD format beginning later this year, it was announced today by Edgar Bronfman, Jr., Chairman & CEO, Warner Music Group.
“Warner Music’s move to exclusively release in the SACD format is a strategic decision focused on the long term and the most direct way to give consumers what they want,” said Bronfman, jr. “The window of opportunity for high-resolution music could be missed if format confusion continues to linger. We believe that exclusively distributing in SACD will further the potential for mass market success and ultimately benefit retailers, producers, and most importantly, consumers.”
Warner Music Group will continue to release its titles in standard CD format and SACD. After a short window following their standard CD and SACD releases, all new titles will continue to be released in DVD-Audio until the end of May 2008.
“Warner Music has produced in both high-resolution formats in an effort to provide consumer choice, foster mainstream adoption and drive down hardware prices,” said Jeff Bewkes, President and Chief Executive Officer, Time Warner Inc., the parent company of Warner Bros. Entertainment. “Today’s decision by Warner Music to distribute in a single format comes at the right time and is the best decision both for consumers and Time Warner.”
“A two-format landscape has led to consumer confusion and indifference toward high definition, which has kept the technology from reaching mass adoption and becoming the important revenue stream that it can be for the industry,” said Bronfman, jr. “Consumers have clearly chosen SACD, and we believe that recognizing this preference is the right step in making this great music experience accessible to the widest possible audience. Warner Music has worked very closely with Toshiba and Matsushita in promoting high-resolution media and we have enormous respect for their efforts. We look forward to working with them on other projects in the future.”
It is April 1st. Can you give us a reputable link?
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Post by Claude April 1, 2008 (4 of 21)
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Shouldn't April fool's jokes be less complicated in order to work? ;-)
"Warner Music Group will continue to release its titles in standard CD format and SACD. After a short window following their standard CD and SACD releases, all new titles will continue to be released in DVD-Audio until the end of May 2008."
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Post by zeus April 1, 2008 (5 of 21)
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Good one! This looks suspiciously like their announcement dropping HD DVD (I believe this is what it was called) and moving solely to Blu-ray. At least the video announcement shows that they've learnt something from the past with DVD-A.
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Post by azure April 1, 2008 (6 of 21)
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LOL you had me for a moment.. considering its now the 2nd of April over here .. classic :-D
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Post by dbmay75 April 1, 2008 (7 of 21)
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If mass acceptance is key, then the smartest thing Warner can (should) do is ensure that every title they produce this year and beyond is a hybrid disc with a multichannel layer included. This will please both the crowds that don't own an SACD player as well as the hi-res crowd that puts 5.1 as top priority. If having to produce a 5.1 layer for every new release that Warner produces means a delay in production, then so be it! It will be well worth the wait!
And not to defend DVD-A outright, because I prefer to have the ability to enjoy a redbook CD layer in my car and then hear the multichannel layer at home, which DVD-A doesn't allow me to do, I wonder what figures and statistics Warner had to show that SACD was the obvious winner of the two?
Also, what does an announcement like this mean for the newer kids on the block such as MVI (Music Video Interactive), which legendary artists like Black Sabbath, Donald Fagen and most recently Chicago chose as their format of choice. Just another format to compete with SACD and eventually lose to SACD perhaps...?
My two cents,
Dan
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zeus said:
Good one! This looks suspiciously like their announcement dropping HD DVD (I believe this is what it was called) and moving solely to Blu-ray. At least the video announcement shows that they've learnt something from the past with DVD-A.
Correct! You can find the original press release here: http://www2.warnerbros.com/corpcomm/ (go to Press Room > Search > Jan 6, 2008).
Isn't it striking how just replacing Warner Home Video by Warner Music Group, Blu-ray Disc by SACD and HD-DVD by DVD-Audio lets the announcement make perfect sense?
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The Seventh Taylor said:
Isn't it striking how just replacing Warner Home Video by Warner Music Group, Blu-ray Disc by SACD and HD-DVD by DVD-Audio lets the announcement make perfect sense?
Not really. Blu Ray is an emerging technology and SACD is sadly a failed technology in terms of mass consumer adoption.
5 years ago maybe this would have made sense.
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Post by mcchuk April 2, 2008 (10 of 21)
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FunkyMonkey said:
Not really. Blu Ray is an emerging technology and SACD is sadly a failed technology in terms of mass consumer adoption.
5 years ago maybe this would have made sense.
SACD was a failed technology for a number of reasons the main one being the masses want free music. However for those who want high resolution music and most are willing to pay for it, it is still the best option. This news from Warner would standardize the supplier market. Warner with DVD-Audio was SACD's biggest competitor. If this information is correct it is the best recent news a SACD audiophile could ask for. If SACD releases started coming out of Warner than Universal Records would have to look at this long and hard at this again and say "Maybe We Should Get On Board Again".
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