At last! A decent UK classical chart has been announced. The Official Charts Company has finally created a hit parade of "purely classical" music. I know, I know, it's a wishy-washy definition – when has classical music ever been "purely" anything? But at least it's better than the sham that is the current chart, which is coyly called "combined classical", for which any album can qualify so long as it contains 60% classical music in its makeup. That's the sort of popularity contest that Katherine Jenkins and the marketing heads of crossover-land are going to win every week of the year over Herbert von Karajan or Fritz Reiner.
Gramophone magazine will publish the chart every week on their website, and every month in print, starting with the March edition. According to the BBC, a Gilbert and Sullivan compilation is currently at No1, just ahead of the late, lamented Richard Hickox conducting Holst's The Planets. A good start so far then, for British music.
Here's hoping that the new chart will provide more publicity for the UK's "purely classical" record industry. Despite annual predictions of its imminent demise, it's an industry that is still going strong, with independents like Chandos and Hyperion showing that you can make Bax or Rubbra into small-scale hits, as much as you can Beethoven or Rachmaninov. Now they'll have the chart to prove it.
