Please scroll up a few messages - they are manufacturing additional boxes. As they were not numbered, no crying about a "not so limited edition", please.
Joe Pesci in the Goodfellas would say: “What the f@*& is the world coming to!” Seriously, I have seen many eBay sellers that refuse to ship to Italy. Something to do with problems with the customs and Italian post system, too many lost packages I guess. The Zu(s) are doing fine. What they might lack in finesse they make up in dynamics and soundstage.
Isaac Stern - The Complete Columbia Analogue Recordings (123 € at Amazon.es) This box won't be available much more time, and this is a very good price. I've bought it. https://www.amazon.es/gp/product/B087CRQCVW/
This is a terrific box, and one that should be added to the list of absolute treasures that are available now. Purchase it and you will know that no one has a box with the recordings of a better violinist (well, except for those with the Heifetz box).
All in your opinion, of course Let me just say that Isaac Stern's playing is not to everyone's taste, and whether he was the best violinist after Heifetz, well, I don't think there's consensus about that.
The Ormandy box showed up yesterday, one day before scheduled delivery. It was in perfect shape -- an unscratched, more importantly unbumped, box set sitting inside its protective little box inside a generally unharmed bigger outer box. I've had miserable experiences with shipping from Amazon US. This was so much better -- next time I buy a monstrous megabox I will likely go this same route, ordering from amazon.de and selecting the quicker, more expensive DHL shipping. Thanks again folks for pointing out the amazon.de option for this set -- I really appreciate it.
Actually, I don't think this Amazon Global will ship to any European country! Re: eBay sellers...I have a friend (well known in audio) who guts old electronics and sells the components...he stopped selling to Italy many years ago because Italians were constantly scamming him, like claiming they never received something, that the part was damaged, etc. But, yeah, the postal system here is pretty terrible. Took two months to get some Xmas cookies from my sister! They postal system here has evolved into more of a financial institution...i have my bank account there! But I think it was never very good in delivering mail of any kind.... My Zu Druids are still amazing, and they have plenty of finesse! I'm still pondering over the Ormandy box and now this cheap Stern box! And tomorrow's Juilliard box! I'm trying to conserve money because I'm done with Italy and will be moving to Mexico, probably in September!
I was joking, of course. And I actually don't think Stern is the best violinist after Heifetz. But although I prefer, say, Perlman (and I do prefer Perlman), I don't know that one could say he's "better" than Stern. At the moment, it looks as though one can get the Stern, Perlman, Menuhin, and Grumiaux boxes. I have several, but not all, of those. But I think if one chose any one, two or three of those one would be pretty well set in violinists. Unless you want to collect them all, which I don't think is practical either in terms of listening to them all or storing them in a manner that is convenient.
It’s funny that the Isaac Stern box is only two CDs smaller than the Bruno Walter box. But the Bruno Walter box is a good deal larger than the Stern box. I wonder why decisions are made that way. Is it just because they want a bigger book?
So in the past 2 weeks ive ordered: Bruno Walter - Complete Columbia 77cd Pavarotti - Complete Opera Decca 100 cd Grumiaux - Complete Phillips 74 cd Bernstein - Complete DG 121 cd, 36 dvd, 1 blu Ormandy - Columbia Legacy 120 cd Bruno already here and have been enjoying. Pav should be here this afternoon. Ormandy and Grumiaux have shipped and just waitinf on Bernstein to ship, all should be here next week this should last me through end of the month….
Then I'm sure I have already reached the limit: I have smaller or bigger boxes with Oistrakh (two in fact), Heifetz (the big one), Menuhin (the big one), Perlman (the big one), Grumiaux (like everyone else, the big one), Kremer, Chung, Szeryng, Vengerov + the DG 111 Violin Box. Since, like J.A.W., Stern is not towards the top of my list (as always, just my personal take), I will resist the temptation to get that particular box (and it is a temptation since Sony makes such beautiful ones). And let's not get started on my pianist boxes ...
It seems from everybody's experience here that the Ormandy box, wherever you buy it, either from the various Amazon sites or from other vendors, always comes in Sony's own cardboard box which, together with the external cardboard of the seller, offers good protection from shipping accidents. This is very reassuring. One of my main concerns before I ordered it was its size but it seems that Sony has thought of that. About Stern, in my opinion, he is one of the giants. His recordings of Bartok, Berg, Tchaikovsky, Bernstein, Hindemith, Copland, Mendelssohn, I can go on and on, have stood the test of time and are still considered by many as reference. @sambamaster yes, I think you might be right, Amazon Global they might not ship to Europe. Good luck with your move to Mexico, man! Although, with a nickname like sambamaster I would think that Brazil might be a better choice. Just kidding!
My Riccardo Muti box just arrived too, all the way to New York City! Amazing. DHL tracking shows it was picked up in Orly (where FNAC must have its warehouse) late yesterday afternoon, flew from Paris to Leipzig very early this morning, went through US customs in New York City at 5am, left the DHL facility (presumably at JFK) at 9am, was put on a local delivery truck at 10:50am, and was delivered to my door at 12:30pm. I feel almost guilty thinking about all the work and precision timing it took to get this totally non-urgent, low-priority, luxury consumer good all the way from Paris to my place in less than a day. Packaging was quite good. No manufacturer's box, but the Muti box was well wrapped in heavy-duty bubble wrap (the kind with large squares and made out of thick plastic) and placed in a cardboard outer box. One corner of the Muti box appears to be very slightly rounded (I wouldn't have noticed if I wasn't looking very closely), the sort of thing which might well have happened at the manufacturer's end before FNAC even received it. Needless to say, I'm very impressed by FNAC's (and DHL's) service.
I had poor impulse control today and ordered 3 discounted boxes from jpc.de: Szell conducts Dvorak and Smetana (7 CDs) (28% off) Boccherini Edition (Brilliant) (37 CDs) (40% off) Yo Yo Ma & Emanuel Ax -Celebration (21 CDs) (50% off) Total, including shipping to US, was 68.83 EUR, or about $82 USD--works out to $1.26 a disc.
Well, I lived in Brazil 40 years ago, been back many times, but probably not ever again. I've also organized a HUGE Brazilian Carnaval party in Austin, Texas since 1978, until a few years ago when demos changed, we had over 6,000 people in the room, dancing SAMBA! In September I will have to sift through layers of Italian and Portuguese to get to my Spanish brain cells! I got the Quartetto Italiano 14-cd Warner box a few days ago. Will post a report soon. Have already listened to the whole thing.
Double benefits. Enhanced music library. And fitness training via substantial weight lifting. Congratulations.
