If it is a genre, hold music, it's fair to say, is a troubled one with few hits. It's not really meant to be loved or even listened to — it's meant to communicate something specific: Don't hang up. (Cornell makes this plea specifically at the end of his song.) Silence is believed to be a death knell for phone calls — people will simply think the line is dead and hang up. This is true even on non-hold calls; it's why phone companies transmit something called a "comfort tone" over phone lines, a barely audible synthetic noise that signals a connection is still there.
Probably a lot less than you think! There are variety of affordable on hold message plans & pricing, and typically a small monthly fee starting at around $59 can be all it takes to get a professional sound for your brand, enhance the caller on hold experience and drive revenues.

The most common codecs are G729 (compressed) and G711 (non-compressed). They are designed to compress human speech, and often cause a loss of audio fidelity — which is worse in some languages than others. On hold music that has been specifically designed for that purpose, to be used with VoIP systems and codecs, can sound great. But it is not easy to come by.
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