Everyone have their RCA LIVING STEREO SACDs yet? Better grab 'em! Leontyne Price...

I recently bought the Living stereo box set - 60 cd-s for 80 dollars- not sacds - but the soundquality os absolutely stunning anyway. And the music for the most part superlative, Listening to almost 60 years old recordings with a soundquaality rarely heard in new recordngs is weird. Thinking about that they used 2 -3microphones recoeding the whole things makes iteven more weird
Guess I must get volume 2 of these truly amazing recordings

 

Wow...stumbled on this just in time...6 more purchased.

 

Bill,

Thanks for the heads up ! I just grabbed nine of them to add to my collection.

Beethoven & Mendelssohn: Violin Concertos - Heifetz/Munch

Chopin: Ballades & Scherzos - Rubinstein

Chopin: Piano Concertos Nos. 1 & 2 - Rubinstein

Franck, Liszt, Saint-Saens - Rubinstein, Wallenstein

Mendelssohn: Symphonies Nos. 4 & 5 - Munch

Puccini: Madame Butterfly - Leinsdorf

Respighi: Pines of Rome, Fountains of Rome, Debussy: La Mer - Reiner

Richard Strauss: Music from Salome, Elektra - Borkh/Reiner

Tchaikovsky: Symphony No. 6 - Monteux

Bill

 

I also have the Living Stereo Box Set which as Bemagnus notes ARE NOT the SACDs. As these are the same titles in the box set do I REALLY need to repurchase these as SACDs?

Honest question. Full Disclosure...I don't even have a SACD player but intend to get one one day and if these are night and day better than just the Redbook versions of these titles it would be nice to have them before they are OOP and $60 each instead of $6!!!!

 

Even if the stereo information on the sacd is an improvement over the redbook CD versions, what the sacds also contain are the 3-track surround (Left / Center / Right) mixes. If you have any interest in hearing these (which can be quite impressive) the sacds are the only place to get them. If the stereo is all you want, then the CDs would suffice I suppose.
------ Chris

 

Got 10! Thanks for the heads up!

 

The SACD's are great but some are oop. The CD's are fine......

 

Don t have a SACD- player but can very well believe the sound is spectacular. However/ the sound on my CD-s are extremely impressive- gorgeous and given the price if the boxset s real bargain. However I am no audophile but the warmth, clarity and general sound on these cd- s are stunning

 

Well...the SACDs definitely sound better. The three-channel mixes are extraordinary on a revealing system. I would pick and choose your favorite Living Stereo albums and get them on SACD, if I were you.

 

I've just finished watching it. As you said, it's truly fascinating. Thank you, Mr. Hoffman!

 

After buying six of these SACD titles during last year's sale, I decided to grab 10 more titles this weekend. I picked most of them for either $4.79 or $5.99 each. (Leontyne Price's "Madama Butterfly, which is a 2-disc SACD set, was $9.79.) As others have said, these discs are spectacular, and the prices are scandalously cheap. The three-channel SACD presentations are jaw dropping even on a modest system, and the regular-CD layers, which I've copied to CD-R for listening in the car, are very impressive.
My favorite is probably the first of the series that I bought, which couples Billy The Kid with the Grand Canyon Suite. I see that disc is among the titles that can still be picked up for a few bucks.

 

I should listen to you guys more often. I had a bunch of these in my cart at $5.99 each and forgot that yesterday was the 30th of the month.

Alas signed in to my account this morning to find that they are all $9.99 now and the 40% sale is over…SIGH…

At least I saved myself $100+!

 

OK, so I bought the SACD of Leontyne Price's "Madama Butterfly." I went to the designated site to download the libretto, and the website -- not just that page of the site -- has apparently been taken down. The "new" Sony Masterworks site doesn't have a search engine...

I realize this SACD came out in 2006, but you'd think Sony would still have the libretto on line since the SACDs are still selling... Anyone know where I can download the thing? (The site designated in the SACD booklet is http://opera.sonybmgmasterworks.com/libretti/livingstereo/)

 

Happened across Turandot at a CD store yesterday and snagged it. Not sure why, but I thought it was a single disc of highlights--probably because of the price. Imagine how lucky I felt when I opened it and realized I'd just paid US$19 for a brand new two-disc SACD opera.

 

Hi Clark
PM me with your email & I will send you the original RCA file. A member here some years ago, sent me files on all librettos and I stored them on a thumb. That RCA/BMG/Sony site is long gone.

 

Thanks to whomever it was who pointed-out this SACD sale again! I kicked myself hard when I missed it last time around. But this time I did my best to complete my set. The only ones that I'm missing now appear to be a couple of the ultra rare ones which have skyrocketed in price.

 

TeacFan,
Thanks for the kind offer. Just today I acquired the libretto by buying a sealed copy of the original RCA 3-LP boxed set. It was $1.99 on ebay! I imagine the downloadable version is a PDF of this same booklet, as it includes the original liner notes, artwork, the complete libretto, performer bios, technical notes, and some great photos from the recording sessions.

 

Clark, ya got a deal. The PDF file is 16 pages in color back to back if I was to print it, which I never have. You got an expanded deal with photos & performers bio + it is probably LP size.

 

Yeah, it's 12"x12", and the page layout of the libretto is very nice. BMG should reissue the hybrid-SACD, which is truly outstanding, but in a 12" x 12" box with the booklet/libretto.

Here are a few of the photos from the booklet, including shots of the then-new RCA Studios in Rome.

 

WoW, great photos. Them cats were serious. The numbers on the floor in the first photo were used to replicate singer /mike placement when they came in a day or so later & the room may have been cleared. That session lasted 10 days I believe. Wonder what happened to the building? As far as reissuing the set..in your dreams. And as our fearless leader once pointed out, all folk involved in that recording are dead.

 

I'm really bummed that I missed the annual sale at BN. I thought it would be the end of October.
Does anybody know if I need to wait for another 11 months before these discs go on sale again? No sale on Black Friday or any other occasion???

 

^^^ eBay and AMZN third-party sellers have quite a few of these at comparable prices.

 

So I've been buying a few of these, and today I noticed that titles that were hard-to-get and required going through third party sellers on Amazon Marketplace a few weeks ago are now cheaply available on Amazon itself. These ARE the SACD titles (or at least listed as such on Amazon).

For example, I paid $30 for a used copy of Madame Butterfly used but now it's going for half that new. The Leontyne Price title is only $12-something.

There are some titles that haven't made their way back yet--La Traviata for one.

Anyway, grab 'em if you want 'em.

 

Madame Butterfly does fluctuate quite a bit. Due to the issue with getting a disc 2 that is actually a real disc 2 , if purchased new I recommended using someone who has hassle free returns like Amazon. Took me 3 tries to finally get a good set.

Seems that La Boheme is now the most expensive on the secondary market. Something that will likely change.

 

Yeah to a point, but you have to pay $3.99 to ship each one. No combined shipping with Amazon Sellers. The numbers just don't crunch compared to Barnes, especially after the free shipping kicks in.