Box Blather

Started by Ken B, April 19, 2014, 07:07:51 PM

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jlaurson

this bis seems to fit here very well... two more installments w/general discussion on box sets to follow.



This guy... one of maybe only a dozen I can think of.


Fresh from Forbes:



MAY 29, 2015 @ 3:01 PM
Boxing Classical Music: Ferenc Fricsay on Deutsche Grammophon

There's something wonderful about classical music—certainly in its form as recorded music—having
become a commodity: It is more easily available than ever before, in greater variety than ever before,
and at a lower cost than ever before. Notable part of this trend is the packaging and re-packaging and
re-releasing of trusty records as part of box sets. Everything by everyone seems available affordably—
and we are talking about the physical product, not downloads, which you might think would spearhead
this development... perhaps even at the expense of the trusty CD.

Box sets used to be expensive, much cherished trophies of the collector. I remember my first set of
complete Beethoven Sonatas (incidentally not a particularly satisfying set, as it would eventually turn
out) and my first Ring Cycle (still a worthy member of the collection) and the hushed reverence that
went along with their purchase. With the tumbling of prices, that's changed entirely (furthered by the
budgetary constraints that are not those of one's student days). There are still some box sets that are
expensive, made with great care, and easy to covet. But more-so it has become a trend for labels to
use sets to manufacture bargain-basement collections that can be had for a few bucks per disc and
entice listeners to fill gaps in their collections they might not otherwise have had bothered or bee able
to fill....

Moonfish

Quote from: jlaurson on June 01, 2015, 10:50:22 AM
this bis seems to fit here very well... two more installments w/general discussion on box sets to follow.



Excellent article! I wish that DG could follow some of your suggestions to improve their future box sets. I'm also glad that you mentioned the upcoming vol 2 at the end of the piece! Thanks!
"Every time you spend money you are casting a vote for the kind of world you want...."
Anna Lappé

Mookalafalas

Import.CDs has basically tripled their postage fees to foreign countries :'(   Actually, their old fees were stupid-low--it cost the same to ship a single disc or a giant box. I didn't see how they could make money (on the giant boxes, that is). Maybe they couldn't and that is why they adjusted upwards.  Good for them, bad for me.
It's all good...


Moonfish

Quote from: jlaurson on June 12, 2015, 04:10:50 AM
Fresh from Forbes:


JUN 12, 2015
Boxing Classical Music: Claudio Abbado On Sony/RCA


Thanks JL! An interesting review of the Abbado Sony set. You certainly had mixed feelings about this specific compilation. Are you an Abbado fan overall? Personally I never have connected to his recordings (yet), but I still have plenty to cover. I keep listening as his reputation seems formidable and his followers countless.   0:)
"Every time you spend money you are casting a vote for the kind of world you want...."
Anna Lappé

Ken B

Quote from: Moonfish on June 12, 2015, 01:20:33 PM
Thanks JL! An interesting review of the Abbado Sony set. You certainly had mixed feelings about this specific compilation. Are you an Abbado fan overall? Personally I never have connected to his recordings (yet), but I still have plenty to cover. I keep listening as his reputation seems formidable and his followers countless.   0:)

The big DG box made me a believer. One thing I like is he has a distinctive approach -- lower tension, let the detail tell -- without being eccentric about it. So its not just another generic Symphony A by composer B. Stan Skrow is another box I really like. He's more the reverential seriousness type, higher tension than Abbado. Also a superb, and very different, box.

jlaurson

#586
Quote from: Moonfish on June 12, 2015, 01:20:33 PM
Thanks JL! An interesting review of the Abbado Sony set. You certainly had mixed feelings about this specific compilation. Are you an Abbado fan overall? Personally I never have connected to his recordings (yet), but I still have plenty to cover. I keep listening as his reputation seems formidable and his followers countless.   0:)

I can't be said to be a fan of Abbado, over-all, because I think he is all over the place. Between insanely boring and brilliant. He's sure to have been some genius and I bought into the hype to some degree and there's much I love... but it's hardly a composer where I think: Whatever he touched he turned to gold. Those are Kubelik and Fricsay and Ancerl maybe. Wand, but not, perhaps QUITE as consistently. But perhaps those are only biases, also... Abbado's Mendelsson bores me to tears, for one... one of the few obvious flubs for DG he did. But well enough regarded by so many, as you point out.

I certainly do love me some "Stan Skrow", as does Ken B. Him, unlike Abbado, I've heard in concert, too... and that was always quite something.

jlaurson


SAY... would you terribly mind if we took this conversation to Forbes? (Just cutting and pasting it in there?
They measure "success", so to say, by hits and by activity / interaction... so this would fly very nicely and make it seem as if the stuff I write was actually being read.

Moonfish

Quote from: jlaurson on June 13, 2015, 07:45:08 AM
SAY... would you terribly mind if we took this conversation to Forbes? (Just cutting and pasting it in there?
They measure "success", so to say, by hits and by activity / interaction... so this would fly very nicely and make it seem as if the stuff I write was actually being read.

Ok, JL! I copied my comments over to your Forbes post.   :)
"Every time you spend money you are casting a vote for the kind of world you want...."
Anna Lappé

jlaurson

Quote from: Moonfish on June 13, 2015, 01:11:47 PM
Ok, JL! I copied my comments over to your Forbes post.   :)

Thanks kindly for playing along.  ;)

bigshot

I got the DGG Abbado symphonies box, and as soon as I dropped it into circulation on my media server, I kept running across symphonies with slack conducting and no passion. I'd pull out my iPhone and look at the name on the file, and every time it was from that box. If the Sony box is anything like that, I'll pass on it.

It's odd because I have some Verdi operas conducted by Abbado and I like them.

king ubu

Thanks Jens - interesting read! I've got both Abbado boxes around, but I'm not completely sold on either of them so far. The Mozart - in both boxes - didn't convince me at all, but I quite enjoyed the Mendelssohn, I'm afraid. Where else should I look for better Mendelssohn then? Guess that's off topic here, though, sorry.

Anyway, I've still only heard small parts of both sets and am looking forward to crawling through them as time goes by.
Es wollt ein meydlein grasen gan:
Fick mich, lieber Peter!
Und do die roten röslein stan:
Fick mich, lieber Peter!
Fick mich mehr, du hast dein ehr.
Kannstu nit, ich wills dich lern.
Fick mich, lieber Peter!

http://ubus-notizen.blogspot.ch/

jlaurson

#592
Quote from: bigshot on June 14, 2015, 03:28:36 PM
I got the DGG Abbado symphonies box, and as soon as I dropped it into circulation on my media server, I kept running across symphonies with slack conducting and no passion. I'd pull out my iPhone and look at the name on the file, and every time it was from that box. If the Sony box is anything like that, I'll pass on it.

It's odd because I have some Verdi operas conducted by Abbado and I like them.

...because his Verdi is uniformly excellent.

Funny, now that I think back, I remember having an early suspicion of the Abbado-cult; an early in-built hesitancy... well before I had the actual knowledge and experience and at a time when I should have bought into the Abbado cult whole-heartedly, because in principle it was right up my alley. Still, I hesitated for years, to pick up his Mahler 5 (ditto No.1), because I suspected it to be dull. Don't know why I had that suspicion, since I readily lapped up most everything Abbado at the time... and that may have been (just) before I realized his slack Mendelssohn and before he issued the Mahler Sixth that made such a splash and which I found so utterly lacking. (See also: Mahler Survey) It turns out that I was quite wrong, at least about the First, which is a much better recording than I had intuited. The Fifth is fine, too, if not a great recording and in most every way outdone by Boulez.

jlaurson

Quote from: king ubu on June 14, 2015, 10:31:59 PMWhere else should I look for better Mendelssohn then? Guess that's off topic here, though, sorry.


Not to worry. Though it would be (selfishly) excellent to have this exchange on Forbes.com instead, so as to show them that somebody actually cares and gets involved, I'll be happy to answer here, too: DEFINITELY Dohnanyi!

from an earlier go at the subject:
Quote from: jlaurson on March 25, 2013, 02:32:38 PM
Quote from: Octave on March 25, 2013, 01:44:12 PM
Jens, you link to an OOP Mendelssohn/Dohnanyi set; I'm assuming this one contains the same recordings.  Odd, I never remember seeing it, even though it was released Stateside in 2010.


F. Mendelssohn-B.
Dohnanyi / WPh
Decca


Correct. 'Tis the one.

Quote from: Jeffrey Smith on March 25, 2013, 01:36:44 PM(As said before, I've got Karajan and Abbado.  Comparing them, I can understand why you mentioned Herbert and not Claudio.)

Oh, gawd yes. How can such a wonderful conductor (Claudio) be so dreadfully boring in all these symphonies. Yikes. But if you have Karajan, at least you are in good hands. His entire Mendelssohn Symphony cycle, really, is quite outstanding. And (Karajan-detraction coming natural to many of us, myself included) quite/intuitively underrated.

king ubu

#594
Thanks again, Jens!

Last (I think) question: where to go for a Tchaiko cycle?
Es wollt ein meydlein grasen gan:
Fick mich, lieber Peter!
Und do die roten röslein stan:
Fick mich, lieber Peter!
Fick mich mehr, du hast dein ehr.
Kannstu nit, ich wills dich lern.
Fick mich, lieber Peter!

http://ubus-notizen.blogspot.ch/

Moonfish

Quote from: king ubu on June 14, 2015, 11:20:44 PM
Thanks again, Jens!

Last (I think) question: where to go for a Tchaiko cycle?

Not quite a cycle, but still a "must"...    ;)

[asin] B000001G8B[/asin]
"Every time you spend money you are casting a vote for the kind of world you want...."
Anna Lappé

king ubu

Just had a look at my list ... got those, they're in the DG cube (which I've still to explore - there's one disc of HvK doing Mendelssohn there, too). Anyway, I guess I better first listen to what I already have (note to self  ;))
Es wollt ein meydlein grasen gan:
Fick mich, lieber Peter!
Und do die roten röslein stan:
Fick mich, lieber Peter!
Fick mich mehr, du hast dein ehr.
Kannstu nit, ich wills dich lern.
Fick mich, lieber Peter!

http://ubus-notizen.blogspot.ch/

jlaurson

Quote from: Moonfish on June 15, 2015, 12:04:05 AM
Not quite a cycle, but still a "must"...    ;)


P.I. Tchaikovsky, Symphonies 4-6
Y.Mravinsky / Leningrad PO
DG


BTW: Apart from getting them individually, is there any way of getting these in a way that DOESN'T split No.5 down the middle??


Moonfish

Quote from: jlaurson on June 15, 2015, 12:48:23 AM
BTW: Apart from getting them individually, is there any way of getting these in a way that DOESN'T split No.5 down the middle??

You mean a 3 disc set? The individual SACDs are a bit on the expensive side!  :o
"Every time you spend money you are casting a vote for the kind of world you want...."
Anna Lappé

Moonfish

Quote from: king ubu on June 15, 2015, 12:17:56 AM
Just had a look at my list ... got those, they're in the DG cube (which I've still to explore - there's one disc of HvK doing Mendelssohn there, too). Anyway, I guess I better first listen to what I already have (note to self  ;))

I think I will make a note of that as well....     :P
"Every time you spend money you are casting a vote for the kind of world you want...."
Anna Lappé