Apple Music will now include Chinese music, courtesy deal with Tencent Music Entertainment

Four years after Tencent and Sweden had entered into an agreement, the East and the West have come together once again – this time, to the delight of music lovers across the globe. Now, Apple Music will include works from Chinese musicians.

That’s right, the agreement between Apple and Tencent Music Entertainment, the arm of Chinese tech giant Tencent that deals with online music, will see record labels and artists who are a part of TME Music Cloud to distribute their works through Apple Music. This fits in with what the TME has been doing over the past years – creating a platform for independent musicians for distributing their works, attracting fans, hosting virtual concerts, and generating income.

This means that you can now listen to Chinese composers if you have Apple Music.

“Bringing TME’s premium music content from Chinese labels and creators to Apple Music users worldwide will enable music lovers to explore China’s unique music culture and genres, further enhancing the global discovery of Chinese music and assisting in the international development of Chinese musicians,” the company said in a press release.

This will also help promote more high-quality Chinese music in the international markets and bring it to the forefront. Apple Music is the perfect way for Chinese music to enter the global arena, given that it is immensely popular and is the second-largest music streaming service worldwide – it is estimated that Apple Music had 72 million subscribers worldwide in June 2020, up by four million from December of the previous year.

The TME Music Cloud, which happens to be a new global music distribution platform, will be adopting “content self-management,” “online distribution and promotion,” “settlement of royalties,” and “music data insights.” It will also provide global level omni-channel distribution for a wide range of partner labels and creators, and its industry resources and Tencent’s social ecology will offer comprehensive assistance to content creators in content production and promotion as well as commercial realization.