I'm there right now and have found this thread invaluable (so thanks to everyone who contributed! your information has been hugely helpful!!). I'm in my mid 40s and the label-themed sets have really provided a great foundation for my collection...between the Decca Sound sets (and the two Philips boxes), the Living Stereo sets, and a handful of the DG sets I've picked up, I feel like I have a great array of titles for the rest of my lifetime. Plus if something really catches me I can explore it or the composer in greater depth. (For that reason I've obviously gone more Artist/Label-centric in buying these boxes to cover as wide a swath of material as possible). There's a lot of value in there -- I calculated my budget and how much I spent, and I think I've spent something like $1.50/disc across all of them (and most are full albums with nearly as many bonus "fillers"). I can only imagine what it would've cost buying all of these discs individually, or the amount of space those discs would've taken up at one point in time. I've made an investment to be sure but can't say I haven't been pleased with any of them! If something isn't a favorite, I just move along to the next title and give it a spin
Hello friend, I can not answer for the others but I have a clear opinion about my own reason for that. I´m relatively new to Classical Music, I´ve been exploring it and enjoying it for 15 years by now (previously before 32 years old I had no deep interest in Classical Music). When I started listening 15 year ago I soon realized this universe has just so huge (almost scaring), thousands of composers, millions of compositions, and to make things more difficult, sometimes hundreds of different recordings for the same piece (on that time I´ve read somewhere there was more than 400 recordings of Vivaldi´s Four Seasons alone). Life was just too short for this huge amazing universe of Classical Music and I had already spared the first 32 years When I was building my collection, with a few hundreds of individual CD´s (which were and still are very expensive in my country) the Box-Set fever began. I can not express enough how grateful I am for that. Suddently the recording companies had hugely narrowed down my Search, by providing me pre-selected recordings within a specified criteria (composer, conductor, recording technology, recording series, etc etc), and even taking into account that "label doing for me" was not the ideal, they definetely narrowed down my Search and provided good selection of recording given any of their criterias. I have get to know much more composers and compositions (and conductors, and interpreters, and producers, etc) that have enabled a hugely satisfying personal experience, an amazing journey of fantastic emotions, than I would have gone through if I had to find all by myself within a so short period of time. For the favorite compositions I get other recordings to get different perspectives (sometimes dozens of different recordings as alternative to the ones in the Box-Sets), sometimes I find in the box recordings that I will never give a second try... but in general it has been really worth, for me personally, to go through the Box-Sets. And then there is the money (price-per-CD) saved in this journey... Very grateful they exist Certainly others will have other reason, while others will never agree with my reasons, but I´m just very happy my collection became Box-Set centralized. Kindest regards, DB
I think the Bach set coming out is out on an island with very limited company. It's a premium-priced "complete works" setup, but existing fans may not see any agreement with the programming choices on offer. Likewise, completests will wonder why not every performance by a given performer or ensemble was used. The smaller "cube" boxes for a given composer serve as a "value for money" introduction to a composer for new fans or those looking to move from vinyl to CD. That makes sense. Likewise, performer or conductor boxes do a lot to fill in complete collections. These can be more expensive, but the amount of music on offer usually makes up the difference. This... eh. It has its fans, and I certainly won't argue against it's virtue as a lovely artifact, but it's not like there's consensus on the best interpretations of every Bach work, which makes stumping for this set tricky. Why spend a premium if it's not the definitive, last word? That's just me though. Were money no object, I may pick it up anyway just because it looks like a lovely collection, but when one must prioritize music purchases, it's got a number of weaknesses on its balance sheet.
I mentioned earlier that the Harmonia Mundi "Music of the Enlightenment" was priced at €20.99, delivered to the U.S. Originally, the discounted box was only available to French Amazon Prime members; It's now available to all customers at that price.
I think if I never bought another Bach set I would be okay given the Bach I already own and comparatively small number of times that I reach for a Bach recording. So why am I adding 222 CDs to my collection? Well, there's the box, which has obvious pride of ownership, but there are plenty of nice boxes. I'm also interested in the programming, which appeals to me as a broad deep dive: two versions each of several of the famous choral works for example, (presumably) selected to throw light upon one another in contrast; three Art(s) of Fugue; eight discs of later music based upon Bach; five disc of historical performances so that you can see the evolution of the performing tradition; eight discs of Bach’s contemporaries and family; the DVD. Sure, if you're a Bach expert then you can do all this for yourself from existing recordings, but that's not me and I'm hoping that DG have done it well. Having extensive liner notes and texts also helps. And, although I have a fair amount of Bach, I will be adding a lot of works that I don't own. I don't feel that 333 is a set for Bach experts and I certainly hope it's not for complete novices but - if the programming is motivated by something more than “what they could readily licence to put in the box” (and I'm not qualified to say) - then it's a fascinating collection for the curious Bach listener. It looks like a set that I'd want to open up and explore, rather than one of the many complete sets that one owns for the peace of mind of just having everything in your library on the off-chance that there's a Zombie Apocalypse or something.
I'm no Bach expert, but I do have Bach recordings by a fair number of those featured in the box, and my impression is that DG/Decca has made an effort to get most of the top names onboard, and not only those from their own labels either. The cantatas, for example, feature many of the main HIP contenders, and I am hoping they have enough expertise and interest to pick what they think is the best version for the individual cantatas, but that is probably asking too much.
I think the Mozart 225 box was excellent. I bought it for my Dad (the German edition) and he loves it. The sound on all the discs I've heard is top notch, and the consistency of listening throughout is a nice feature. Dad has all the Bach he wants to have from six decades of collecting, but when a similar Beethoven comes out I'll get that for him because Wolfgang and Ludwig are his "guys."
If you like piano concertos then I can highly recommend this 40CD box set from Brilliant Classics. some well known pieces but a lot are more obscure works from composers such as Field, Hummel, Raff, Pierne, Sinding, Beach, Lyapunov, Rubinstein, Casella and many more. Recordings are mostly Vox Turnabout 1960's , 1970's. I picked up a copy for £40 so £1 a disc is a bargain
Coming in September. Descriptions at various Amazons say 20cd, cover image says 22cd. I don't think I have any, or many, of these; so this will probably be a must for me. She is a lion! Martha Argerich: THE LUGANO RECORDINGS - LEGENDARY LIVE PERFORMANCES (Warner, 22cd, Sept 2018)
Though this does raise the question of whether Ms. Argerich had approval over the image used in this set.
There are now more details to be had at the Bach333 site, in particulat six detailed pdf-files on the contents. They can be dowloaded by clicking on the six different subheadings found under "6 Tracklisting Books": Bach333 - 333 Years of J.S. Bach .
I just looked at the first book which is the DVD and the first 17 discs of the sacred cantatas. Most of it is from Suzuki and Gardiner which means the licensed a lot. It also includes a few by Herreweghe, Koopman, Kuijken and Richter. Some of those are licensed too.
Well, Suzuki and Gardiner for many listeners are the two best options for Bach´s cantatas, then it looks like Universal Music did a good job with Bach Edition, as they had done with Mozart box (where the symphonies are mostly with Hogwood and Pinnock for example). Just curious... Gardiner has recorded cantatas for Archiv (Universal Music) before continuing his project with his own label Sole deo Gloria. I guess the ones included here are the Archiv recordings, am I right? Not the Sole deo Gloria ones (which would be licensed). With regarding Suzuki, is BIS part of Universal Music group?
I’ve gone through the whole track list. I already have 90% of the cantatas and orchestral works and close to half of the keyboard works. I probably have 80-90 discs worth of it already. The only way I’ll be getting it is if it really drops in price.
Gardiner recorded 8 discs of the cantatas for Arkiv. I’m sure they’re all there but there’s a lot more than that here by him. So they’ve licensed a lot of those. BIS is an independent so they licensed those as well. I saw a few other artists that I associate with non-Univesal labels who also recorded some albums on Universal labels, Herreweghe, Hewitt, Leonardt, Harnoncourt, Koopman, etc. I looks like the bulk of the licensed material is in the cantatas.
Hello, has this 33-CD box from Sony been already posted here ? https://www.amazon.de/gp/product/B07F3QSRPT/ref=pe_50311_271446881_em_1p_1_ti
I am sure everyone is aware of Berkshire Record Outlet (BRO), but I only just now ran across ClassicSelect, which seems like a similar outlet, albeit with a flashier website, and perhaps not as extensive a selection? ClassicSelect - Classical Music At Great Prices Shipping seems reasonable* if maybe a little more than BRO; perhaps $10+ for an order of ~$50+. One nice deal: the four-SACD set of Alan Gilbert's Nielsen....$12! And 25% off orders of $40+. But unlike BRO in most cases, it looks like they deal in new merch as well; on their splashdown page, I see the new enormous Szell/Cleveland set for $150, cheaper than Target, esp. if there is no tax assessed. (When you click on the pic/link, the price seems to go back to $200, but I think they automatically take that 25% discount into account. Curious if anyone has ordered stuff from ClassicSelect, and if the experience was good. I keep thinking I should wait on the Szell, but I have been waiting on it for years. * EDIT: Actually, it looks like there is free shipping over $30, even on the Szell. Hot damn
Several of the CDs for Bach 333 have a running time well over 80 minutes ... makes me apprehensive about how reliably they will play.
Looks interesting. Will take a look, though the selection of Berkshire Record Outlet is truly outstanding. Their retro website is also a lot of fun. Have in fact an order from them on the way.
Thanks for the tip! Target just inexplicably canceled my second order for the set (its now unavailable for ordering there altogether), so evidently they dont want my money lol. I will give these folks a try, $150 shipped saves a few more bucks in the process!
Absolutely, I am a BRO Berk. Even my impulse purchases from them are seldom regretted...usually interesting and cheap. One megabox from ClassicSelect that seems more reasonable (or more existent) than elsewhere for some time now is the big Pierre Boulez COLUMBIA ALBUMS box from Sony (67cd), which seems to be ~$166 before the 25% off, which latter seems to apply, looking at my cart. I know $125 isn't a steal for a Sony megabox (this set was apparently below US$100 at Amazon.de over two years ago); but lots of place simply don't even carry this anymore. $1.86/disc seems comparable to what you'd pay for the dinky little Sony "Masters" miniboxes still being issued. I might just jump!
