Virgin Classics was a record label founded in 1988 as part of Richard Branson's
Virgin Records
Virgin Records is a British record label owned by Universal Music Group. They were originally founded as a British independent record label in 1972 by entrepreneurs Richard Branson, Simon Draper, Nik Powell, and musician Tom Newman (musician), ...
.
The unit, along with
EMI Classics, was acquired by
Universal Music Group
Universal Music Group N.V. (often abbreviated as UMG and referred to as Universal Music Group or Universal Music) is a Netherlands, Dutch–United States, American multinational Music industry, music corporation under Law of the Netherlands, ...
in 2012 as part of the takeover of the
EMI Music Group, however the terms of the
European Commission
The European Commission (EC) is the primary Executive (government), executive arm of the European Union (EU). It operates as a cabinet government, with a number of European Commissioner, members of the Commission (directorial system, informall ...
's September 2012 approval of the takeover requires divestment of the classical labels which were sold on 7 February 2013 to
Warner Music Group
Warner Music Group Corp., commonly abbreviated as WMG, is an American Multinational corporation, multinational entertainment and record label Conglomerate (company), conglomerate headquartered in New York City. It is one of the "Record label#M ...
. The
European Union
The European Union (EU) is a supranational union, supranational political union, political and economic union of Member state of the European Union, member states that are Geography of the European Union, located primarily in Europe. The u ...
approved the deal in May 2013. Warner Music's
Warner Classics unit absorbed the Virgin Classics artists roster and catalogue into
Erato Records
Erato Records is a record label founded in 1953 as Erato Disques S.A. by Philippe Loury to promote French classical music. Loury was head of éditions musicales Costallat. His first releases in France were licensed from the Haydn Society of Bo ...
but lost the rights to use either the EMI or Virgin names.
Principal artists
*
Piotr Anderszewski
*
Leif Ove Andsnes
*
Nicholas Angelich
*
Fabio Biondi
*
Gautier Capuçon
*
Renaud Capuçon
*
Max Emanuel Cencic
*
William Christie
*
Hughes de Courson
*
Alan Curtis (conductor)
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Diana Damrau
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David Daniels
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Natalie Dessay
*
Joyce DiDonato
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David Fray
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Vivica Genaux
*
Véronique Gens
*
Emmanuelle Haïm
*
Daniel Harding
*
Philippe Jaroussky
*
Paavo Järvi
*
Truls Mørk
*
Roger Norrington
*
Artemis Quartet
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Quatuor Ebène
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Christina Pluhar
*
Valeriy Sokolov
*
Christian Tetzlaff
*
Alexandre Tharaud
*
Rolando Villazón (early recordings)
See also
*
EMI Classics
References
{{Authority control
Classical music record labels
EMI
French record labels
Record labels established in 1988
Record labels disestablished in 2013