The biggest regrets concerning your record collection

[Brahmsian]

I go under the knife tomorrow morning, so I'll definitely be listening to the Tureck tonight (my favorite recording of any repertoire).

Best of luck Don and a quick recovery.

[mc ukrneal]

I go under the knife tomorrow morning, so I'll definitely be listening to the Tureck tonight (my favorite recording of any repertoire).

First the over the top Ashkenazy bashing (ok, maybe a tickle from you, but bashing from others), and then you choose THIS recording. But your health is far more important, so we hope for the best here!!  Far more important that you get well, so we can have a nice friendly debate about whatever we want! 

[Bulldog]

Nothing serious, I hope.  Best of luck.

Thanks much - I expect success.

[AndyD.]

I go under the knife tomorrow morning, so I'll definitely be listening to the Tureck tonight (my favorite recording of any repertoire).

Yeah Don, I hope everything works out for you tomorrow morning. Right before the holidays, yee....

[Bulldog]

Yeah Don, I hope everything works out for you tomorrow morning. Right before the holidays, yee....

Actually, tomorrow is a good time for the procedure.  My wife and I are scheduled to visit our new grandson in Boston the second week of January, so surgery tomorrow should give me plenty of time to get to full strength before the trip.  Also, not being a Christian helps on this one.

[Bulldog]

First the over the top Ashkenazy bashing (ok, maybe a tickle from you, but bashing from others), and then you choose THIS recording.

THIS recording must not have your approval.  Anything in particular you don't like about the Tureck?

[Scarpia]

Thanks much - I expect success.

My theory, Bulldog got a new CD player, and just realized that remote from the old one will have to be surgically removed from his hand.     Ooops, shouldn't be joking about these things. 

[DavidW]

If you don't make it, can I have just 10% of your Goldberg collection?   Not asking much...

Anyway hope everything goes well.

[Bulldog]

My theory, Bulldog got a new CD player, and just realized that remote from the old one will have to be surgically removed from his hand.   

An interesting theory except that I hardly ever use the CD player remote.   

[Antoine Marchand]

Actually, tomorrow is a good time for the procedure.  My wife and I are scheduled to visit our new grandson in Boston the second week of January, so surgery tomorrow should give me plenty of time to get to full strength before the trip.  Also, not being a Christian helps on this one.

... and Hanukkah ended on December 9. 

Best wishes from Chile, Don! 

[Bulldog]

If you don't make it, can I have just 10% of your Goldberg collection?  

Sure, you can have the bottom 10% (and that's not shabby at all).

[Bulldog]

... and Hanukkah ended on December 9. 

Best wishes from Chile, Don! 

Unfortunately, Hanukkah was a casualty this year.  My wife always treats it generously with a lot of food, presents and good cheer; but this year her heart wasn't in it. 

Anyways, I thank you folks for your good wishes.  The way I figure it, I can use all the wishes I can get.  An evangelical friend of mine told me that she and her buddies were praying daily for me.  With people on my side and my own mindset in the "strong and healthy" mode, I can't go wrong.

[Josquin des Prez]

Also, not being a Christian helps on this one.

You don't have to be a Christian to celebrate Christmas. Jews are WAY too butthurt about this holyday.

[SonicMan46]

Thanks much - I expect success.

Don - just coming into this thread and saw your comment about surgery - hope just a minor issue - best of luck - Dave

[mc ukrneal]

THIS recording must not have your approval.  Anything in particular you don't like about the Tureck?

Nothing. I was being dramatic, because some of the comments preceeding your comments were over the top. I have the BBC recording of Tureck (I and II), which I have come to detest, but I don't hold that against her, becuase she clearly has a lot to say in the music. I also find that I sometimes come around to an interpretation, though this was one I initially enjoyed until I heard others.

[Octo_Russ]

My favourite versions of the WTC are Gulda on Philips, and Nikolayeva on Olympia, insights aplenty, i can't wait until Perahia records them when he gets round to it.

[(poco) Sforzando]

Or all those where when one character changes cloth not even those intimate to him or her can recognize him/her. Cosi comes to mind but there are dozens more. Stories based on such silly mistaken identities bore me. I shall gladly take the music but spare me the stories.

Just curious: do you consider Shakespearean comedy silly as well? Because mistaken identity is an essential component in many of them. For example, in Twelfth Night, Viola dresses as a man, calling herself Cesario, and is later mistaken for her twin brother Sebastian. I wouldn't be surprised if Shakespeare had at least one set of boy twins to play his female roles, as twinship is essential to the Comedy of Errors and Twelfth Night. As for mistaken identity, the virtuosic treatment is found in As You Like It, where the boy actor playing Rosalind disguises herself as a young man, and then later pretends to be a girl.

[(poco) Sforzando]

I won't speak for Springrite, but I think the Magic flute has the most unfavorable ratio of story to music.  The first act works nicely but it breaks down after that (for me).

I could not disagree more. Since this question keeps coming up, I'm going to dredge up a comment I posted at rec.music.opera almost ten years ago:

"The plot of The Magic Flute is silly only if judged by the standards of the
realistic play and novel, which are primarily 19th-century phenomena. The
Magic Flute is not a work of realism but a fable and an allegory, and has
been suggested here, works far better on stage than on recordings. (And why
shouldn't it? Mozart did not write his operas with your CD players in mind.)

"Schikaneder's libretto has been criticized for inconsistency; that is, why
do the Queen of the Night and her Ladies, who first appear to be "good"
characters, turn out to be the villains, and why do Sarastro and his
priests, who are first reputed to be the villains, turn out to be the
embodiments of goodness and wisdom? Legend has it that the plot was
"changed" midstream. But if this part of the story is experienced from
Tamino's point of view, we the audience participate in his growth from
naive, unquestioning trust through mature understanding of good and evil,
and thus there is no real inconsistency. (The pivotal moment in Tamino's
education is his lengthy dialogue in the finale to Act One with the Speaker,
whom someone above referred as the "dreary priest.")

"Despite some of the doggerel in the verse, the plot is really very well
executed, and if you accept it without criticizing the opera for being
something it is not, works very well. The main strength of the libretto is
the beautiful way in which the serious Tamino-Pamina main plot intertwines
with the comic Papageno-Pagagena subplot. Both Tamino and Papageno must
undergo various trials before they can achieve some degree of wisdom and
unite with the women they love. Tamino must first suffer silence and
separation from Pamina before he is found worthy of her, and when they are
united they must together endure the trials of water and fire, an
allegorical initiation into the solemn Masonic rites that were so important
to Mozart in his own life. Papageno by contrast, purely l'homme moyen
sensuel, must endure frustration and separation from Papagena, but though
his needs and wants are purely animalistic and he lacks the spirituality of
Tamino's quest, Papageno at least contemplates ending his life, which shows
sufficient selflessness that he is granted the right to reunite with his
love.

"Mozart IMO responded so wonderfully well to this clever libretto because it
represented the two main sides of his own personality - the mature and
serious developing young man, drawn to Sarastro's humane philosophy of
forgiveness and the rejection of revenge, and the clownish adolescent still
in love with food, wine, smutty jokes, and sex. The film Amadeus caught only
one side of this personality, but both existed, and they account in my mind
for the level of musical engagement Mozart demonstrates throughout - in
contrast to the almost perfunctory music of La Clemenza di Tito which he was
composing about the same time. Mozart pours into this seemingly slight story
a wealth of musical forms and textures - from the coloratura of the Queen of
the Night's arias, through the simple folk-like ditties for Papageno, to the
neo-Baroque chorale prelude style of the music for the Two Men in Armor, the
austere recitative for the Speaker, the dignified arias for Sarastro, and
more. Together with Le Nozze di Figaro, this is, I believe, his most
completely successful opera."

[(poco) Sforzando]

You don't have to be a Christian to celebrate Christmas. Jews are WAY too butthurt about this holyday.

Well, you would be too if you had to ensure two months worth of lousy Christmas carol arrangements in every store you entered. At least they could have one or two lousy Chanukah song arrangements too.

[Brian]

Not really a regret, but I feel like I've heard all I want and there's nothing new that will excite me like my current group of favorite composers. When I try to think of something to buy classical-wise, I'm left scratching my head. Multiple recordings of the same work don't interest me that much anymore.

I'm gonna quote this because nobody else has yet, and also because I understand where you're coming from, Sackbut. I've always had this sort of gnawing deep-inside fear that some day I will run out of things to discover and have everything I want to hear. 2010 proved that wrong - I discovered Roussel's orchestral music, the first half of the Beethoven string quartets, the Weinberg cello concerto, and other dandy stuff - but even so I still have that sort of paranoia. I still have most of Mahler's, Bruckner's, and Haydn's symphonies to hear for the first time, the Beethoven quartets Opp 95-133 ditto, and have been intentionally avoiding all Schubert chamber music in order to discover it later. I guess the thing is, there never actually will be a "oops, I just ran out of new music to hear for the first time" moment, but the fear of it remains, and also, the fear that you/I/we've already heard most of our all-time favorites.

What a weird problem. It's irrational but so compelling.