Universal Music is working to digitise the remainder of its local release collection to take advantage of all digital music services available here.
The global company recently launched the uDiscover app for Spotify for playlist creation and access to its library of editorial content.
“We’ve been working hard on making sure all local catalogue content is available through all digital business partners live in our market,” says digital business director Myra Hemara.
The company’s challenge is to add the earlier repertoire that was never digitised. That means sourcing original master recordings
and finding artists to get clearance, says Hemara.
“This is still a work in progress with some of the more obscure catalogue releases,” she says, adding about 90 percent of local releases have probably been digitised.
Digital service providers are licensed to reproduce music, via record labels, by the owner of the recording and owner/licensee of the music.
In New Zealand these include Google Play, iTunes, Spotify, Amplifier, and internet radio services like iheartradio and Pandora.
uDiscover builds playlists based around the artists users search on and their listening history. The algorithm creates links between tracks, based on artist or genre, to suggest the next track in the playlist.
