Import CDs has one of the worst customer services of any site I’ve seen even when buying from them on eBay or Amazon where they have a marketplace storefront. Another terrible American seller is MovieMars whose business practices are nothing short of horrendous (this seller also has a storefront on Amazon MP and eBay). I do use Discogs from time to time, but this is only if I’m looking for something that’s OOP and difficult to find. I’ve come to find that there aren’t many good European sellers either. It’s pretty much Amazon for me since 2001 or so (quite possibly earlier than this as I believe I started to do business with them around 1999). JPC is a good site, but, boy, does it take quite some time to receive a package from them if you live in the US (as I do). And yes, their packaging is first-rate.
Replies by Mister Jones and others got me inspired to go back and check what kind of deals I've made at the different Amazons through the 15 or so years I have been actively shopping. The following list are some of them, ranging from good to silly good (all amounts include shipping): Handel Edition [Brilliant] (65 CDs, $26.47 ) Henryk Szeryng Complete Edition (44 CDs, $27.58) Claudio Arrau - Complete Philips Recordings (80 CDs, £83.32) Dana Ciocarlie: Robert Schumann: The Live Complete Solo Piano Works (13 CDs, £4.21 ) Sviatoslav Richter: Complete HMV & Teldec Recordings (24 CDs, £38.06) Sviatoslav Richter: Complete Decca, Philips & DG Recordings (51 CDs, £48.82) Sviatoslav Richter Live At Carnegie Hall (13 CDs, £8.76) Martha Argerich: The Complete Recordings On Deutsche Grammophon (48 CDs, EUR 56,86) Arthur Rubinstein - The Complete Album Collection (144 CDs, EUR 150,76) Julius Katchen - The Complete Decca Recordings (35 CDs, EUR 37,90) Byron Janis: The Complete RCA Collection (12 CDs, £21.53 ) Van Cliburn - Complete Album Collection (29 CDs, £38.52 ) Leon Fleisher Complete Album Collection (23 CDs, £35.64) Daniel Barenboim: The Solo Recordings (39 CDs, EUR 22,55) Rostropovich Complete Recordings on DG (37 CDs, EUR 37,90) The David Oistrakh Edition on DG (22 CDs, EUR 52,51) James Galway: the Complete Rca Album Collection (73 CDs, EUR 88,31) Narciso Yepes: The Complete Solo Recordings on Dg (20 CDs, EUR 19,40) Amadeus Quartet: The Complete Recordings (70 CDs, EUR 70,97) Emerson String Quartet: Complete Recordings On Deutsche Grammophon (52 CDs, £65.37) Klaus Tennstedt: The Complete EMI Mahler Recordings (16 CDs, £15.67 ) Abbado: The Complete RCA And Sony Album Collection (39 CDs, £31.90) Pierre Boulez: The Complete Sony Collection (67 CDs, £70.73) Fritz Reiner: Complete RCA Collection (63 CDs, £77.94) Pierre Monteux: Complete Decca Recordings (24 CDs, EUR 26,36) Leopold Stokowski: Complete Decca Recordings (23 CDs, EUR 22,55) Karl Böhm: Great Recordings 1953-1972 (17 CDs, EUR 19,40) Complete Works of J. S. Bach (Edition Bachakademie, Hänssler) (172 CDs, EUR 95,05) Philippe Herreweghe: J.S. Bach Complete Recordings [on Harmonia Mundi] (27 CDs, £52.08) Renata Tebaldi: Voce D'Angelo-the Complete Decca Recording (66 CDs, EUR 55,31)
This Amadeus Quartet box is really beautiful The box is in the style of that of Karl Richter. In general, it is obvious that a lot of thought and care was put into this edition. A large format booklet with tons of interesting photos (circa 50, many of them showing AQ in various informal situations), discs with spines with the content printed on them (like in Sony boxes) and of course beautiful original covers. Plus the copies of a few original "Aufnameprotokoll"s
Good price for this excellent set DAVID OISTRAKH The Complete EMI Recordings, CLASSICS 17 CD set Box Set 5099921471223 | eBay
Actually, some of my best deals have been on music other than classical: Zappa Frank: Hot Rats Sessions 50Th Ann. (EUR 12,29 ) The Rolling Stones: Steel Wheels Live (Box 3 Cd + 2Dvd + B.Ray Limited Edt.) (EUR 10,24) Waters Muddy: Hoochie Coochie Man: Complete Chess Masters, Vol. 2: 1952-1958 (just 2 CDs, £12.29 against todays £160!) Billie Holiday: The Complete Masters 1933-1959 [SONY] (15 CDs, £24.79) Charlie Parker: The Complete Masters 1941-1954 [SONY] (13 CDs, EUR 34,98) Miles Davis, John Coltrane: The Complete Columbia Recordings 1955 - 1961 (6 CDs, £12.01)
I would be very surprised if anything were wrong with the disks. I have now ten disks left to rip and very few thus far had been re-authored.
Strange to me, that before I saw him mentioned here, I'd never encountered him or seen one of his videos. I think he more or less nailed it. Though I think we all vary at how deep we go in any of the individual stages, I find myself hovering at the brink of stage 7. I have 98% of my box sets with me, but my individual CDs and older (2/3/4 disc) "box" sets are in storage across the country and have been for over 5 years now. I can't actually imagine reintegrating them into my life (and storage) as most of it is readily available in HiRes on Qobuz. I already pull out CDs only rarely. I think I'll be hovering on the brink for the next decade (these boxes are such beautiful things to have around), but I am starting to think I will eventually take the plunge and offload them. When I waver, I shudder at what my wife and kids will have to deal with if its all still here after I go. In the meantime, still enjoying collecting these sets. I've slowed dramatically, but there are still some gems coming out (Ormandy, Orpheus, etc). Cheers, D
Great set, 100 percent agreed. Really nice touches with the Aufnahmeprotokoll and the four boxes inside the box bearing the individual members of the group. Now, if DG only would have made the book into a hardcover one, this would be a close to perfect set.
This was the first ever Hurwitz video I watched, I kid you not. I leave thinking that a) this was a damn long video and b) I will simply stay in the combined phases 1 and 2 - phases I've been in forever. These two phases are storage space and treasure consuming enough - and I have promised myself that I won't dive into smaller labels, as great as their recordings might be. The recordings released by Sony Classical (Columbia, CBS, Harmonia Mundi, Vivarte), Universal Music Classical (Deutsche Grammophon, Decca, Philips, Mercury) & Warner Classics (Teldec, Erato, EMI) contain a lifetime's worth of exploring. Plus, there's jazz and well-produced pop, too.
I've been through all stages, but only in a more discrete manner. For example, I've gone up to a particular stage with string quartets and up to another stage with lieder (especially Fischer-Dieskau). I definitely went into stage six with Bob Dylan before (mercifully) advancing to stage seven several years ago. If I'm creeping up the ladder with anything right now it's organ music, though I still have many rungs to go to reach the top. But I think I'm too old to get to an advanced (if that's the right word) stage with anything at this point in my life.
You know, another good thing about classical music is that there are not really many real bootleg recordings. Only very few of these get upgraded to official releases - Richter and Horowitz come to mind. But other than that? There's no FoH console that can keep an inconspicuous recording going, and nobody's holding up a Decca tree in the audience either, though that would be a spectacle to behold. No mega box money to be made from this, also - so we can spend our money on the real deals, whatever these may be to each of us.
There is another nice touch: CD 70, which is a kind of joke, but a very nice one Really, this is one of the best boxes in terms of presentation. So you see, Deutsche Grammophon? You can do it! Why haven't you done the same with the Gardiner box?
How did the CD get to you, normal mail (Poste Italiane), package or something else? Mine was shipped June 1st and it's still not here.
Nice set! I understand that the performance is usually winning over the sound quality. Considering that some of the recordings are from 1951 up to 1987, how is the overall sound quality and remastering of this set?
I wanted to ask the same question. It have a lot of LP recordings by the Amadeus and they are not among the best.
Since the advent of the quarantine I have purchased very little. As you say, prices have increased exponentially over the past five years. Part of the appeal of the mega box to me was that I could get 50 CDs for $35 or so. Now that they cost $150 or more, the proposition is much less attractive. Additionally, I now have the sets of all of the conductors and performers I wanted--I have the complete output of Karajan, Bernstein, Szell, Reiner, Munch, etc. I have boxes featuring the complete work of Rubinstein, Heifetz, Gould, etc. The new boxes, high priced and featuring artists I consider to be of the second tier, just aren't very appealing. My ability to purchase from overseas also has radically diminished. I understand that it's more important to ship medications, food, clothing and the like than CDs. No problem there. But many of the amazons still won't ship to where I live, and I have never had the tremendous experiences with JPC that many of you talk about. They can't address packages properly, which has caused delivery delays of 2 or more months for me. And before you start, maybe we Americans are morons. But "8000 York Road" is not "York Road 8000." And it causes postal workers here in the US to essentially melt down and not deliver packages. So, yes, I get frustrated that JPC seems unable to write down the address in the form I provide, something I discovered you must do with international mail 40+ years ago when I had a German penpal. So I buy a lot less. Other than additional Ormandy boxes, there's not much left I want.
My favorite seller was, is and will always (probably) be Amazon. In addition to competitive prices, two day shipping, etc. their customer service is light years away from anyone else. Case in point: I talked to them yesterday about my Grumiaux box. I wanted to see if there is something they can do about it, since Decca is totally unresponsive to my emails. So, I had a chat with an Amazon representative in the morning where I explained to them that my disc 45 is missing while disc 44 is duplicated. Amazon's response was to refund me the price of the whole box, all $164.59 that I paid for it. The whole thing took me 5 minutes and I got the Grumiaux box for free. Can any other store beat this kind of customer service?
