This just arrived, it will be getting a spin very soon! Brahms: Symphonies 1-4 Szell-CO Sony Japan SACD
So you remember those Golden Years! I started collecting classical in the mid-90s, first CDs & then LPs as well.
Awesome. I don't like the DG recordings. Bizarre tempos that fly in the face of the scores but not to my liking. Sometimes I like bizarre tempos. Not in this case.
I went to McKay yesterday for the first time in four or five months & came home with 17 LPs (45 cents each) & 39 CDs (average 79 cents each). Everything classical except two CDs. I played this CD first. Recorded 12/3-5/66 at WFMT, Chicago. Producer: James Ginsburg (son of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg). Engineer: Bill Maylone. The violinist, who played an Amati instrument from 1617, is now Rachel Barton Pine.
I started collecting classical vinyl in the 1970s, and then started buying CDs in the mid 1980s. I sold off all my vinyl before joining the Air Force in 1983, and did a similar but not complete purge with CDs around the middle of the first decade of the new millennium.
I don't listen to Tchaikovsky very much, but I couldn't pass up this out of print set for 8 bucks. It's in mint condition too!
Tchaikovsky is like a warm blanket sometimes. But in the end that is usually what we reach for. Like I did today.
I've got no. 5 by Ormandy on an old Delos CD. And I've got the Pletnev box which I don't really listen to.
I started listening to classical a lot on the radio in the late-70s & later was able to tape friends' LPs. In the early 90s I checked out a lot of classical CDs from the library & taped them. Finally as more money became available in the mid-90s I started buying.
Another promo, this one with an ugly radio station sticker. These were Stokowski's last recordings, made 5/31, 6/2 & 6/4, 1977, Abbey Road Studio No. 1. Stokowski was 95 and died a little over three months later. His first recordings were made 10/22/17. Producer: Roy Emerson. Engineers: Neville Boyling (EMI) & Mike Ross-Trevor (CBS).
I've managed to completely miss this classical thread. Do we have to choose sides and/or swear fealty to either this one or "Classical Corner"? I woke up old; SHF moves too fast for me. Might as well roll out a little stocktaking of my recent listening for my own amusement: 1. Just starting to working through the Messiaen COMPLETE WORK (DG) box. Was rather excited by Vingt Regards (by Muraro) today. 2. Just finished Kondrashin's set of Shostakovich symphonies etc. I'm going to seek out at least one more recording of Symphs 10 and 14, as those made an extra special impression. 3. Just getting into the Borodin II cycle of Shostakovich'a string quartets. Powerful. Listened to their Quintet w/Richter today. 4. Working through Marin Alsop's Samuel Barber recordings for Naxos. I will listen to the classic recording of VANESSA soon.
There are quite a few of these releases. There are also many Melodiya recordings which were licensed to Angel. With Columbia it was certainly an effort to reach out to the Soviets to promote understanding.
This morning: CD 56 from Szell box. Features Rudolf Serkin. Bartok Concerto 1 and Prokofiev Concerto 4. Columbia and Philadelphia orchestras respectively. I have very little of Serkin in my collection so this is especially interesting.
