Have You Ever Just Been So Overwhelmed With Music That You're Just Lost?

[Karl Henning]

. . . About the only CD I've given away because it was terrible enough that I knew I would never ever listen to it again was by Cameron Carpenter.

YES!!!

(And no, Jeffrey didn't palm it off on me!) 

[Brahmsian]

One of the things I plan to do over my next vacation is to cull my collection. Make room for new recordings and donate older recordings that I never listen to anymore to my public library.

Always a great thing to do, donate to the public library.  I have done that with a few discs.

Would any of this culling involve Delius? 

[Mirror Image]

Always a great thing to do, donate to the public library.  I have done that with a few discs.

Would any of this culling involve Delius? 

Yep, a lot of my Delius will go. I am going to keep the box sets (Decca, EMI, Heritage), the Barbirolli set, and the Bo Holten series on Danacord though.

[bigshot]

Too much is never enough.

[kyjo]

Yep, a lot of my Delius will go. I am going to keep the box sets (Decca, EMI, Heritage), the Barbirolli set, and the Bo Holten series on Danacord though.

I'm almost afraid to hear what else is going.....probably all the Romantic Era composers.....

[Mirror Image]

I'm almost afraid to hear what else is going.....probably all the Romantic Era composers.....

Dear lord pull your self together man! No, I'm not going to be getting rid of my Romantic Era recordings but will be getting rid of any duplicates. Not that I have that large of a Romantic Era collection.

[Brian]

I cull my herd occasionally and sell them to Half Price Books; I've probably gotten rid of 200 or so discs that way in the last 2 years. Take note, if you're near the San Antonio (Bandera), Austin (Lamar), or Dallas (Northwest Hwy) stores. Many of these are discs that I find it very unlikely I'll ever want to hear again. Regret has kicked in 3 or 4 times, but I'm not sure I've yet rebought any such albums.

When I have duplicates, I usually give them to a music-loving student friend who can't really afford to go CD shopping. Thus when I wound up with two Bernstein Symphony Editions after a shipping mixup, he got one of them, and he doesn't know it but since I got the Gigantic Arthur Rubinstein Box of Giganticness, my 11CD Rubinstein Plays Chopin box is soon to be his.

[kyjo]

Dear lord pull your self together man! No, I'm not going to be getting rid of my Romantic Era recordings but will be getting rid of any duplicates. Not that I have that large of a Romantic Era collection.

I was only jesting!

[kyjo]

I cull my herd occasionally and sell them to Half Price Books

Yeah, I'm thinking about doing the same. When I first got into classical music, I bought a lot of "best of" collections etc. that I never listen to anymore.

[Brahmsian]

Dear lord pull your self together man!

[Pat B]

For the life of me, I don't understand why you people mass buy so much and then complain about the "pile" you have to listen to.  Why in the world do you buy so much?  Why are you then reduced to having to listen to your "pile" of discs.  Enjoy what you have and quit amassing so much.

I'm not sure that complaining is the right word for what anybody is doing.

In my case, I don't keep track of my Pile on a day-to-day basis so I was surprised when I counted it up.

If I have a complaint, it's that I don't have enough time for all this great music.

[bigshot]

The longer I am interested in classical music, the more my interest leans to unique and interesting interpretations... particularly in romantic era music that lends itself to different approaches. Culling myself back to one particular interpretation would kill my interest totally.

[DavidW]

I have a similar philosophy.  If I decide to listen to, for example, Brahms' 2nd symphony, I enjoy having several options at hand to pick from.  I get a certain amount of indirect pleasure even from the recordings I did not listen to on that particular occasion.  What tends to happen to me is that I get interested in a new composer, and in my enthusiasm pick up other recordings of music by the same composer, which are held in reserve until the urge to listen to that composer returns.  The thing that can annoy me is getting to the point of thinking I "should" enjoy composer 'X' and spend fruitless time trying to appreciate it.  On the other hand, there are composers that I hated at first and came to enjoy.

I complete agree!  When I had the queue I was really forcing myself to listen to alot of a composer even if a single listening session scratches that itch.  It's really so much more enjoyable to just spontaneously listen to something based on my mood and preference at that time.  You're night it doesn't naturally leading to exploring new composers.

[Madiel]

The most effective solution I've found to dealing with the pile is to create a cyclic plan, mixing new with older or at least creating variety within the pile by having different eras and types of music.  Rather than getting burned out by desperately trying to listen to the new material/new composers.

Of course, my pile never gets to anywhere NEAR the size of some of you folk.  The last big purchase was around 30-40 CDs and that was undoubtedly the biggest single purchase ever.  And in the year since the only reason I've bought anything else was because it was super rare and finally turned up on my eBay search.  I've ALMOST reached the end of that pile, basically with 9 months worth of listening.

[marvinbrown]

The most effective solution I've found to dealing with the pile is to create a cyclic plan, mixing new with older or at least creating variety within the pile by having different eras and types of music.  Rather than getting burned out by desperately trying to listen to the new material/new composers.

Of course, my pile never gets to anywhere NEAR the size of some of you folk.  The last big purchase was around 30-40 CDs and that was undoubtedly the biggest single purchase ever.  And in the year since the only reason I've bought anything else was because it was super rare and finally turned up on my eBay search.  I've ALMOST reached the end of that pile, basically with 9 months worth of listening.

  I agree.  Having  rotating sessions between eras even genres "CYCLIC PLAN" is an excellent idea. Although I have been known to listen to 2 or even 3 operas back to back, breaking things up and mixing genres and styles is the best way to attack a large "to listen to" pile.  Mine is currently at little over 200 CDs.  Lots of Haydn boxsets (piano sonatas, vocal works, wind divertimenti), Schoenberg, Couperin, Vaughn Williams, Gluzanov, Vivaldi, the Decca Mozart Complete operas boxset and there is a 1/3 left on the Decca Verdi Complete works boxset as well as Barenboim's Wagner operas boxset

  The way I see it, this is some of the finest music ever composed. Our to listen to piles should not cause us stress or anxiety but excitement........ we should approach it with the attitude that we are going to discover something new, different and hopefully exciting. If it becomes a chore the "magic" is lost.

  marvin

[aukhawk]

The amount of space you save is the only advantage to having a purely digital collection.

Instant access. 
Yes, I know that is a blessing or a curse depending on your point of view - but I long ago lost the desire to make my listening into a ritual.  That sort of thing maybe made sense with the old LP collection and a temperamental unipivot tone arm - but not with CD.  Digitizing the lot has revitalised my listening generally - better than it ever was.

[Parsifal]

Instant access. 
Yes, I know that is a blessing or a curse depending on your point of view - but I long ago lost the desire to make my listening into a ritual.  That sort of thing maybe made sense with the old LP collection and a temperamental unipivot tone arm - but not with CD.  Digitizing the lot has revitalised my listening generally - better than it ever was.

Generally agree.  And the positive aspect of the listening ritual can still be preserved (deciding what you want to listen to and listening using the big stereo in an environment free of distractions).  I'm in the process of transfering the CDs to lossless digital (FLAC) and use a computer to stream to my CD player's digital input.  The experience of streaming from the computer is just as good as listening to a disc.  My annoyance now is that only a fraction of the collection has been transfered and starting up the computer is a barrier to listening to the digitized part of the collection.  But that will change.

[stingo]

Generally agree.  And the positive aspect of the listening ritual can still be preserved (deciding what you want to listen to and listening using the big stereo in an environment free of distractions).  I'm in the process of transfering the CDs to lossless digital (FLAC) and use a computer to stream to my CD player's digital input.  The experience of streaming from the computer is just as good as listening to a disc.  My annoyance now is that only a fraction of the collection has been transfered and starting up the computer is a barrier to listening to the digitized part of the collection.  But that will change.

I've found that using a NAS (Network Attached Storage) setup has been the way to go. Not only for disk size, but because I can stream directly from it without requiring a computer.

[kishnevi]

Jeffrey it sounds like you have a storage problem that needs solving.

I need to get myself to go and get CD racks or other forms of shelving,  that's all.  Merely a problem of time and motivation.

BTW, in listening to my personal version of the Pile, I definitely mix genres and composers around.  At the moment,  the listening is taken from
the Electrola/EMI Germany 11 CD box of one act operas (Kurzopern)--one opera per CD
the Rilling cycle of cantatas from the Hanssler complete Bach box (to be followed by the instrumental works from that box)
an EMI box of Britten's chamber and piano music
the incomplete Mozart symphony cycle from Tate/ECO
a DVD of Jurowski conducting the OAE in Beethoven's Fourth and Seventh
the Brilliant 100 CD Symphonies box, from which Nielsen (Kuchar) is the next segment to be heard

Usually, one CD from each box gets listened to each day,  but not always, and the only one I'm making a point of playing at least one or two CDs a day is the Bach.

[bigshot]

My annoyance now is that only a fraction of the collection has been transfered and starting up the computer is a barrier to listening to the digitized part of the collection.

Ripping is a huge hurdle for a large collection, but a little bit every week gets the job done eventually.

My Mac Mini music server runs 24/7 streaming music all over the house over wifi. Every week or two I have to restart it, but it's quite dependable, and doesn't have any problem running all the time.