To my surprise, I received in the mail a few days ago the inaugural volume of the print magazine Listen: Life With Classical Music. I'd never heard of it before (I suppose since it was the first issue), and I couldn't figure out how I got on the distribution list for it. The website, which I linked above, was no help, only offering an online subscription and a few email addresses. After a quick Google search, I discovered that it was launched by ArkivMusic.com, America's leading online retailer of classical music CDs and DVDs, as a lifestyle magazine for classical music fans. A BusinessWire.com article has the story:
"ArkivMusic.com Launches New Venture: LISTEN: Life with Classical Music"
Another few results from Google revealed that complimentary magazines were sent to people who had purchased something (in some cases, only one something, once) from ArkivMusic. I know I've made at least one purchase from Arkiv (as chronicled in this post), so I guess that must have been what landed me on the list to receive the magazine.
I read the first couple of articles today at lunch, and was a bit disappointed. If I'm going to get a magazine, I don't particularly want it to have super-long and very indepth articles, because I'll never get around to reading it all; but these articles were too short and had no depth. Almost all of the ads are for recordings that you can buy on Arkiv, too, so as one Google commenter noted, "It seems like a once over lightly publication. The features didn't get very deep into their subjects - mostly puff promo stuff. I suspected it was put out by Archivmusic based on the number of promos in the magazine." I'll probably read the rest of the issue; but if it doesn't get any better, I won't be subscribing.
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