“Record company launches website” is not exactly headline of the year; but this one is slightly different and therefore of note within the world of Sandbox.

The self-explanatory Warner Classics site has been set up by Warner Music and Erato (the label Warner bought in 1999 and then revived in 2013 after Warner acquired EMI Classics and Virgin Classics). The company argues this is in reaction to streaming’s impact on classical in general, with DSPs helping to make it more accessible to broader audiences.

At a basic level, anyone going to the website can stream up to 30 seconds from anything in its catalogue but can link through to their account on Spotify, Apple Music or Deezer to play the full piece.

There are also a number of curated playlists accessible via the site, including ones dedicated to Maria Callas, Beethoven and Piotr Anderszewski as well as one focusing on new releases. At launch, there were 40 playlists in total and all but two of them were branded with the WMG logo in the top left hand corner. The remaining two (The Classical Playlist and Klassik Die Man Hören Muss) come with a Topsify logo. Neither appear to be legacy playlists (all tracks had been added in the past week when Sandbox checked).

It got us wondering. Is this WMG looking to shift around its playlist branding and down rank Topsify as its playlist brand?

Interestingly there is also a video section on the site. At launch there was one video in particular (“Philippe Jaroussky on his Cavalli album, his career, and the new Warner Classics & Erato website”) that is positioned as an exclusive. It links through to a fullscreen YouTube embed with a running time of 12 minutes via the official Warner Classics YouTube channel. This is all, of course, early days – but it could be an interesting testing ground for the site to move into more bespoke (and exclusive) video content and new playlist branding as a hook for users.