Classical Corner Classical Music Corner (thread #65)

That's certainly the most straightforward way to do it, but I prefer to keep separate headshell/cartridge sets for 78s. If you're a fumble-fist like me, it's all too easy to trash a cantilever while swapping out those fiddly little stylus assemblies from a single cartridge body. Another trick: use a heavier headshell for the 78 cartridge and you may be able to swap without needing to mess with rebalancing your tonearm, at least for casual listening.

Incidentally, I'm not sure if there's a 78 stylus, at least from Shure, for the V15-V. The current stock 78 model fits the successor V15V-xMR, issued after a lapse of several years and now itself discontinued, or any of the current Shure models, but I think the older V15-V took a somewhat different assembly. Something to check out, anyhow. Incidentally, I use a set of four V15V-xMR cartridges for both LPs and 78s (1 with the unobtanium stock LP diamond-on-beryllium assembly and three with different custom tips for 78s); unlike the original V15 series, these carts were mfd. at an "offshore" factory in Mexico, not in the US, and some of the early ones had a tooling flaw that prevented the stock 78 stylus assembly from seating properly. That problem seems to have been resolved later in the run.

 

I figured it had to be something like that.

 

Glad to know I could contribute a bit of Christmas cheer!

 

Ouch, I envy you - immensely! I have (in both formats) Webern's Sämtliche Werke für Streichquartette and Beethoven's Op. 18, 74 & 95. And though those are neither the best in the world nor in my modest collection, the LP's are a pleasure to listen to, especially after a "digi diet".

 

one of these superb Kurt Eichhorn Bruckner performances ...... excellent audio quality too.....nowadays still available with alternative cover art :

 

So far this has been one of the most disappointing boxes/selections in recent years (but then again, I'm not so fond of megaboxes in general):



Not only what Robin calls transistoritus (because of the "bleeding ears": my upper hearing limit [the max. of it is somewhere 14kHz] dropped down to 13kHz due to the tiredness of my ears - only a temporary problem, until the limit really drops...), but also due to the sheer mass of music that I dutifully went through (in order to test that the cd's are technically OK): I'm so used to Jochum's recordings of Bruckner symphonies, that I could finely live with them only; there are a lot of fine Beethoven cycles, and for me mr. Wand haven't provided any news/insights; the same applies also to Brahms symphonies; the Schubert set is a nice addendum. Of the two recent symphonic megaboxes (over 20 cd's & at least 2 composers' complete symphonies) I've bothered to buy, I simply pick this as my favourite:



As I once wrote, it was like going back home, a weird feeling of "this is it", it all was somehow cozy and easy like seeing old neighbours or schoolmates. Mozart with (late) romantic orchestra? It's here. And the box is easier to hide than the Wand box.

Now, that all (about Wand) sounds a lot more negative than it really is. No, I don't regret of getting it (despite of the bloody size) but it's not going to be any kind favourite of mine. We all have such LP's and cd's and there will be more in the future, unfortunately. Yes, there's several works I'm going to listen to in coming years.

But that's the only case that has caused me to swap the end tubes: Svetlana's KT88 "C" > JJ's KT88 Red Label. It's been claimed that the new JJ's provide the "brown sound" (why not "golden"? wouldn't that sell better?) of the old Tesla tubes. Can't say... if there wasn't Tesla's in our old huge 1950's/60's radio (and there certainly wasn't KT88's) then I don't have any clue on that. However, I listened the last six or eight Wand cd's with the JJ's, that have now been in use only second time, perhaps some thirty or forty hours in use in toto: the JJ's softened slightly the sound (the combination of Philips/Jan 6188 & RCA 6SN7GTB with the Svetlana's KT88 "C" set provides nicely clear sound but the flip side is too much brightness on certain cd's). So now I know I'd better use JJ's when there's digitus/transistoritus issues, or use Electro-Harmonixes instead of RCA's.

 

Now listening to CD 3, "Motets," from "The Medieval Experience" performed by Pro Cantione Antiqua led by Bruno Turner and The Early Music Consort Of London led by David Munrow on Archiv.

Works by John Dunstable, Guillaume Dufay, Gilles Binchois, Jacob Obrecht and Josquin Desprez.

 

These mega-boxes (whether devoted to an artist or a label) are almost invariably mixed bags. I would guess about a third of my Abbado box will get regular play (whatever regular play means at a time when these boxes have caused my classical library to swell to 2000 discs and I have Spotify). Very few will exceed 50%. The Bruno Walter box is the exception for me - I like almost all of it, although even there the less than SOTA sound quality probably means it won't be a choice as often on my main system.

 

Now playing:
Gustav Mahler – Symphony No.2 "Resurrection"
— Elizabeth Scharzkopf, soprano, Hilde Rossi-Majdan, mezzo-soprano — Philharmonia Chorus & Orchestra, London — Otto Klemperer (EMI Classics) from:

 

Sampling my Fischer-Dieskau Schubert mega-box. A lot of lieder.

 

"We must protest this treatment
Hubert,
sez each newspaper reader.
As someone once remarked to Schubert:
'Take us to your Lieder'."

 

I have not even removed the shrinkwrap on the Gunter Wand box yet after it arrived a few months ago ...

 

I resisted a quote in response to Stuart's reference to new math.

 

Still eagerly awaiting to hear from George P on his massive haul of CD's from PRX that might have required a zipcar ...

 

The following big box has "too" many Lieder and that is the reason it is taking me forever to finish up with my first listen ...

 

I was particular this time and only got 23 CDs. No classical.

 

Just received these yesterday from Arkivmusic. They had a great promotion where you could buy three Naxos cds for $20.

 

The DF-D Schubert box is 21 discs - over 400 lieder!

 

The Schumann box has 35 CD's and there may be quite a few lieder CD's, though I have not yet counted them up ...

 

I had expected a few rare CD's by Richter ...

 

My bargain find of 2014:
7 box sets of The 100 Greatest Recordings of all time issued by The Franklin Mint Record Society



On the last week of December, I found these box sets at a bargain/donation centre called "Talize" and paid CDN$2.99 for each. The records were in near-mint condition and looked like they hadn’t been played at all. Each box had 2 LP's, full-spread liner notes, a letter of the month addressed to the "Subscriber" from Stanley Walker, VP & Director of The Franklin Mint Record Society, and a foam pad to protect the records. For my own easy reference, I wrote the contents of each set on the box cover using a Sharpie pen with gold colored ink.



I have no prior experience or knowledge regarding TFMRS box sets. Are these similar to the Reader's Digest compilations? Maybe someone can enlighten me.

Additional info and my own thoughts (this is a rather long post):

1. These LP's came from a monthly subscription as attested by the monthly letter that accompanied each set. The box arrived each month but most probably, the previous owner(s) didn't have the time or the chance to listen to all of them. There were still 8 or 10 box sets left for sale (Fiedler/Boston Pops; Haydn; Bach; Vivaldi, etc.). but I was not interested in them. I assumed that they had come from the same source.

2. Could these have come from an estate sale? Or did the previous owner simply decide to dispose of them for some little cash? Whatever the reason, the former owner or maybe his/her heirs were not or no longer interested in them, or in classical music for that matter. Neither did anyone of them realize the artistic, and perhaps historical, value of the recordings considering they were made by Szell, Reiner, Stokowski, Horowitz, Heifetz, Toscanini, Rubinstein, Casals, etc.

3. Although the records were in near-mint condition, I washed them using Spin Clean, and put each one back into a Diskeeper Anti-Static Sleeve and inserted the DK sleeve into the original Franklin Mint sleeve.

4. The records were licensed from CBS as indicated on the liner notes. I assume that they were produced using the original analogue master tapes; however, I couldn't tell as I have no basis for comparison. The records sound very good to my ears. Maybe someone can shed light on the source of these records.

5. The Tchaikovsky, Beethoven, Wagner, and Mozart LP’s are nearly quiet with very little, negligible surface noise that is mostly drowned out by the orchestral passages. There's some surface noise on the Horowitz LP's and it is more noticeable during the piano/pianissimo passages. But I can live with it if only to enjoy Mr. Horowitz's playing. I never had the complete Kinderscenen before until now. I only have the Träumerei on CD played by Horowitz, but it’s such a joy to listen to him play the complete Schumann work on vinyl. Also, some surface noise exists on the Rachmaninoff 3rd.

Searching through the internet, I found that the Record Society had issued a jazz edition as well. I hope I get lucky again and find this bounty for the same dirt-cheap price. Meanwhile, these box sets are keepers. I don’t care how much or how little they’re worth; I have no plans of re-selling them.

Here are the complete tracks. Thank you for your time.

Record #11 STEREO
Side A: Schumann: Kinderscenen (Scenes from Childhood)
Kreisleriana, Op. 16 (Beginning)
Side B: Kreisleriana (Conclusion)

Record #12 STEREO
Side A: Chopin: Sonata No. 2 in B-flat minor (the funeral march)
Side B: Liszt: Hungarian Rhapsody No. 19, transcribed by Horowitz
Rachmaninoff: Moment Musical in Bm, Op. 16; Prelude in G#m, Op. 32, and Etude-Tableau in E-flat minor, Op. 39, No. 5
Vladimir Horowitz
<•>

-------------------------------------------------------
Record #25
Side A: *MONO Sibelius: Concerto in Dm for Violin and Orch., Op. 47
Jascha Heifetz, London Philharmonic Orch./Sir Thomas Beecham
Side B: STEREO Rachmaninoff: Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini
Artur Rubinstein, Chicago Symphony Orch. / Fritz Reiner

Record #26 STEREO
Rachmaninoff: Concerto No. 3 in Dm, Op. 30
Vladimir Ashkenazy, Philadelphia Orch. / Eugene Ormandy
<•>

-------------------------------------------------------
Record #39 STEREO
Tchaikovsky: Symphony No. 4 in Fm
London Symphony Orchestra / George Szell

Record #40 STEREO
Tchaikovsky: Symphony No. 5 in Em
New Philharmonia Orch. / Leopold Stokowski
<•>
-------------------------------------------------------
Record #43 STEREO
Side A: - Mozart: Symphony No. 40 in Gm
Cleveland Orch. / George Szell
Side B: Schubert: Symphony No. 5 in B-flat Major
Royal Philharmonic Orch. / Sir Thomas Beecham

Record #44
Side A: *MONO - Bizet: Symphony in C Major
New York Philharmonic / Artur Rodzinski
Side B: STEREO - Mendelssohn: Symphony No. 4 in A Major ("Italian")
Marlboro Festival Orch. / Pablo Casals
<•>
-------------------------------------------------------
Record #47 STEREO
Wagner: Orchestral highlights from "The Ring of Nibelungs"
Cleveland Orch. / George Szell, 1968

Record #48 STEREO
Igor Stravinsky: Firebird
Columbia Symphony Orch. conducted by the composer himself, 1961
<•>

-------------------------------------------------------
Record #71 STEREO
Side A: Beethoven: Symphony No. 5 in Cm
Cleveland Orch. / George Szell
Side B: Beethoven: Symphony No. 4 in B-Flat
Columbia Symphony Orch. / Bruno Walter

Record #72 *MONO
Beethoven: Symphony No. 7 in A Major
New York Philharmonic / Arturo Toscanini, 1936
<•>
-------------------------------------------------------
Record #89 STEREO
Side A: Dvořák: Symphony No. 8 in G Major
Side B: continuation of Dvořák; last track is Smetana's "The Moldau"
Cleveland Orch. / George Szell

Record #90 STEREO
Bartók: Concerto for Orchestra
Chicago Symphony / Fritz Reiner
<•>
The End

Thanks,
Don
.

 

Some fine Schumann playing with excellent sound, too.

 

Now playing CD5 - Inventions, Preludes, etc. from the following box for a first listen ...

 

Welcome, and thanks for sharing! Nice haul if you don't already have them. These were "deluxe" third party reissues marketed at a premium price to an audience outside regular collector channels when new, as you've noted through a mail order subscription scheme. (Franklin Mint catered to the sort of clientele who buy collectors' plates and "limited edition" commemorative medallions.) The material would not all have come from CBS; Toscanini's Beethoven, for instance, was an RCA product. In all events, the recordings by and large are classics and well worth having, although by no means rarities as issued by their original companies. Franklin Mint's presentation was certainly handsome; as to whether the Franklin Mint pressings were better than originals I can't say. I would lose the foam sheets, which with time can deteriorate, crumble, and make a big mess inside the box or even mess up the records. As to prior ownership, who knows? Could be the prior owner is deceased, could be he or she moved into assisted living and could no longer keep records, could be that he or she bought everything on CD reissues and dumped the LPs. Really doesn't matter as long as they're in good shape.