Capping your collection?

[Jo498]

(not sure if this might be better for the Diner, but the "first CD" is in general as well, so I put it here)

It's not really a New Year resolution but something I have thought or had to think about for quite some time. My accumulation of CDs is getting to big to handle (for me) if I do not reduce the rate of new CDs and/or cull more CDs from my shelves. I have probably almost 5000 discs, among these 100s of CDs I hardly (or never) listened to. And even of those I have listened to, there are some I have not listened to for ages, but I keep some for nostalgia, some for "lexical" purposes, that is, I want a recording of e.g. Madama Butterfly because it is a "staple" although I don't like the piece.

But recently I tend to feel a little overwhelmed by a dozen or more alternative recordings even of music I deeply care about. The only comparative listening thread I stuck with all the way through was the Schubert quintet. Until maybe 2009 I had about 3 recordings of that piece (in my recollection: ABQ, the first I bought when I was about 18, Casals and Petersen Q). When the comparative listening here started about a year ago, I owned a dozen (buying 8 or 10 recordings within 2-3 years had been triggered by discussions in some other fora, two were also part of bigger boxes) and I bought two more after that blind listening [and got rid of the Naxos]. But frankly, of the probably around 20 versions I listened to through the blind listening, many or most differences were fairly trivial or at least inconsequential for my enjoyment of the piece. There are probably 10 recordings of the piece I could almost randomly pick one from and be fairly happy if that one was the only one I could keep. And this is a piece I know fairly well (although in general differences between chamber music interpretations are often more subtle than in orchestral).

With lots of other music I am less familiar with, say Nielsen symphonies, I would probably be totally at sea trying to "rate" recordings in some plausible fashion.
I think in most music I cannot really "keep track" of more than 5 or so alternative readings, maybe 10-12 in some I am very fond of or where the spectrum of interpretations is very wide (e.g. Bach on different keyboard instruments in very different interpretive traditions). In many pieces I am not overly fond of or very familiar with, one or two should suffice.

I have been listening to classical music for almost 30 years and buying CDs since 1988. I played the clarinet for several years and occasionally sang in choirs but I was very far from a real musician. I still consider myself a fairly experienced listener. But I am overwhelmed by trying to keep track of 20 or more interpretations of familiar pieces.

In any case, the problem is very general. Today there are usually dozens of recordings available for many standard repertoire pieces, even 100s for some of them. New recordings of standards like Brandenburgs, Messiah or Chopin Scherzi appear every year. Even those who have sufficient money and shelf space (or put everything on harddrives) have only limited time for listening.

An alternative is some kind of "rotation": buy many new recordings but periodically do comparisons and cull other items to keep the overall number manageable. This is somewhat expensive (because one gets very little for used CDs) and takes a lot of time, so most will not be able to do it for all music that interests them.

[The new erato]

I collect, therefore I am.

More classicaly educated members may be able to translate this into Latin.

Culling is the last, desperate measure taken in the seconds before the Titanic is sinking.

[Jo498]

colligo ergo sum.

One question is whether I collect for the sake of having a in some respects complete collection or some special collectible editions or for the purpose of listening to music. I admit that I have a few items I do not want to part with for collector's pride or nostalgia. But with other sets I do not have problems with tearing them apart. E.g. there was an odd DG collection "Musik - Sprache der Welt" about 8 or 10 years ago with two small cardboard boxes of about 10 discs each that were also available separately. I got one complete with the box, some singles of the other, but sold all I did not want or had in other editions that were not so easy to separate. By now I seem to have only 7 left of the 15 or more I must have owned and the rest of the box is filled with other CDs...

For the first about 15 years of my collecting my listening was usually "in sync" with acquisition. Then I had more money and CDs had become cheap both on Ebay and as large boxes. And this got worse.
There are several mechanisms: I bought CDs only because they were cheap or recommended by someone on the internet. Or I became infatuated with some music and kept buying too much of a composer even after that ardor had somewhat subsided. E.g. around 2002 I discovered Handel beyond Messiah and the concerti. I got the cheap Brilliant edition and other CDs. In the beginning I obsessively listened to some new music (I remember the two Brilliant/hungaroton discs with Zadori singing Italian cantatas being played almost daily for a while). But I kept buying Handel operas and oratorios for several years, often without leisure or patience to listen to such 2-3 hour pieces all the way through.

It's even worse with big artist boxes (that's why I do not buy those anymore). The last one I bought in fall 2013 was the huge Rubinstein box. I had about 20 discs of it already in older single incarnations. Not surprisingly, these were the ones with music I cared most about and I had listened to some of them many times over the years. I did not keep track but I have probably listened to only 10 or 12 discs from the new box, maybe 20 but this would also be only about a 7th. And selling or giving away the doubles has been so slow that after more than two years, I still have three of them in my "for sale box", despite giving some away as presents or for pennies to a second-hand-seller.     

I have occasionally been "weeding out" the collection since many years. A lot of that was literally the same recording in a new remastering or space-saving box. But also recordings I either found inferior or when I thought that I did not need more of the same music. Several years ago I got rid of three sets of Haydn's Paris symphonies, all of which I found pretty good but they were superseded by others that were more interesting and I did not want to keep 7 or more sets on my shelves (and since the culling I got another one: Fey's)

But this is much harder for me with some other music, e.g. Beethoven symphonies where I am attached to some recordings and overall the spectrum is much wider because of historical recordings. Still, I find that I have more of these than I can keep track of. (Although it is modest compared to many others here: I have about 10 complete Beethoven sets and probably another 10 non-set recordings of the more famous symphonies, so about 15-20 of each. I think I should get down to maybe 5 sets and 5 singles, except for "specials" and there will be some more I cannot get rid of because they are in boxes I have to keep for other music) One factor is also that I hardly ever listen to Beethoven symphonies anymore, this being music I almost know by heart having listened to it so often in the first 20 years of my attachment to them. But when I listen to them I often like the music so much in almost any interpretation that I cannot part with it...

As a teenager I wanted to get a good recording of a piece because of the music. Although very soon I became aware of differences and "famous" artists or standard recommendations for some pieces this was not so important, for very practical reasons. CDs were fairly expensive (even mid-price) and before the internet even with mail-order companies there was not so much available and in many cases the choice was only between a handful at most of "standard recommendations".

By now, when I wanted to get more familiar with Bach organ music a few months ago, I am not satisfied with listening to the discs I already have, in fact I suspect that I never really got "into" that corpus (with a few exceptions) must be somehow the fault of the recordings I have. So because CDs are dirt cheap I get a dozen or so of Bach's organ music and than, before Xmas, the whole Hänssler box. In this case, I have listened to almost all the single discs by now, but only to about 3 from the box. So again, I acquired stuff faster than I can "digest" it... And with this repertoire I am far from having developed somewhat stable preferences, so can (except sound quality or fairly superficial liking/disliking the sound of an organ) hardly tell whether I like A better than B.


                             

[Mirror Image]

I'm not opposed to culling per se as I have done plenty of it, especially in regards to getting rid of unnecessary duplications, which I send to my friends and so forth. I do, however, feel that there's a reason you have the kind of collection you have in the first place: you simply wanted this or that recording. Whether you feel the need to get rid of something is completely up to you, but it's one thing getting rid of something due to duplication or you simply don't like the music and it's another matter entirely if you're getting rid of something due to space. There are always alternatives for space-saving. Like for example, public storage units or building/adding onto your house (if you live in one and not an apartment). You could also build shelves, which help free up a lot of room.

[prémont]

I sometimes resort to culling to make room for new acquisations. But I only cull CDs I am 99,999% convinced, that I do not want to listen to any more.
So my completism has got a natural limit.

[Jo498]

I am not at the physical threshold (yet). (I dread moving, though. Before my last move in late summer 2013 I sold about 200 CDs, most of them literal doubles, but also some stuff I did not expect to listen to again. So it was 27 boxes with CDs instead of 29 (or so)... big deal. Even with my capping and culling plans I am never going to get to a collection of a thousand discs or less. The point is merely staying around 4-5000 and not advancing to 10000)

But I think I am at a time/attention threshold. What's the point of having 3 or 5 recordings of a piece I do not know well enough to reliably tell which recording I prefer in a comparison, or where I recognize only (seemingly) trivial differences?

With the "Paris symphonies" I got rid of Wolff, Kuijken and Weil. They were all quite good but I preferred Marriner to Wolff for modern chamber orchestra and found Harnoncourt and Brüggen (as well as one disc of Goodman's) considerably more varied and colorful than Kuijken and Weil. I also have Bernstein's (and Fischer's trapped in a box) and Fey's.
If I want to listen to one of these symphonies I usually listen to ONE recording; if I am really into it and want to make comparisons I might listen to two different ones in a row or maybe even to 3-4 over a few days. Having 8-9 instead of 5-6 recordings of the music adds very little, I think.

It is somewhat different with e.g. Bach's keyboard works that are played on different instruments and in styles diverging much more from each other than Kuijken from Weil from Brüggen (of course there are also plenty of stylistically very similar Bach recordings) or with Furtwängler vs. Toscanini vs. Karajan vs. Norrington in Beethoven. But again, there are diminishing returns when having 20 instead of "only" 10 recordings of a piece [most people probably consider it crazy to have 10 recordings of basically the same music...], even granted that one has time, leisure and patience to listen to all of them adequately.

I also realized that there is a lot of music I like well enough but do not really care about sufficiently to have many different recordings to compare them etc.

[Jay F]

I only cull CDs I am 99,999% convinced, that I do not want to listen to any more.

I have over-culled. But it was because I bought a pair of too-revealing speakers, and I suddenly found myself listening mostly to LPs. I started selling a lot of my CDs, but ultimately got rid of the speakers, and found myself having to replace around 20 CDs I'd sold too soon (out of 100 sold from an original collection of ~1500 CDs).

So I agree, please be 99,999% convinced that you don't want to listen any more.

[Todd]

What's the point of having 3 or 5 recordings of a piece I do not know well enough to reliably tell which recording I prefer in a comparison, or where I recognize only (seemingly) trivial differences?

Enjoyment.  Having a library.  No point.  It depends.

The new erato more or less summed up my thoughts on collecting.  Maybe one day I will cull my collection again.  Maybe not. 

[Jo498]

I also got rid sometimes too quickly of some recordings because I was cramped with space or before a move.  I might have re-bought maybe 3-5 CDs although I can only think of one right now: The "great" chorales from Bach's Clavierübung III with Edgar Krapp. I sold those at a time when I rather disliked any organ music maybe 8 years ago and re-bought it last november because it was not expensive and one of the warmly recommended discs by our organ experts.
I also lost patience with re-re-masterings. My setup and/or my ears are not good enough most of the time. I remember a handful recordings where the remastering was considerably better than the old issues I had had (e.g. the Callas/de Sabata Tosca and Klemps Brahms requiem). But I also remember spending an hour or so with A-B-comparing two issues of Furtwängler's Schumann 4th and/or Haydn 88th and while I thought I could hear slight differences I could not for my life say which one sounded BETTER, so I sold of the newer one again (because the older one was in a box).
And tbh when I try comparing recordings I also frequently cannot tell which one I clearly prefer and why. Sometimes I do have a clear preference, sometimes not.

[Todd]

I also lost patience with re-re-masterings.

Remastering isn't a selling point for me based on my listening experience.  Sometimes there is a noticeable improvement, sometimes hardly any, and sometimes I dislike the results.  I've heard a fairly high number of newer remasterings with too much noise reduction, for instance.  And some Ancerl Gold Edition took perfectly fine sounding recordings and applied too much noise reduction and new EQ and reverb and the result sounds too processed. 

[springrite]

I do not intend to cull my collection. I like having almost all of them, even if some are only here because, like building a library, I need it for its own sake (like a composer from Malta, Egypt, or Telemann which I never ever listen to).

Don't forget I am also building the collection to pass on to Kimi who loves music.

[bigshot]

TOO MUCH IS NEVER ENOUGH!

The way I deal with quantities of CDs is to rip everything to a media server and box up the physical CDs in the garage. That way, everything in my collection is instantly available and organized without having to turn my head sideways and squint to read tiny text on CD spines. I found that when I went to a server and gave up the CDs, my listening habits changed. Instead of playing a few dozen CDs over and over, I was listening to a much wider swath of my collection. I also rip to complete works by joining tracks, so I can put the server on shuffle and have great music 24/7. It's increased my scope tremendously.

[Jo498]

Enjoyment.  Having a library.  No point.  It depends.

Sure. But having one recording of Butterfly without ever listening to it is already "having a library". And 10 recordings of a piece are already considered ridiculously many by a lot of listeners.

You or premont may be several times as musical as I am or have a better memory but I still doubt that anyone can really have "a grip" on 100 recordings of a Beethoven sonata or on 30 complete recordings of Bach's organ works.
I think the blind listening comparisons have shown myself and others how well (or often less well) we know music or especially recordings.
Without getting too nostalgic, I sometimes think I got more enjoyment from the music when I had only one recording of a piece. Of course, I have also had experiences when I got considerably more enjoyment from an alternative recording (after all, what is heard/bought first is often determined by odd factors) or when I enjoyed comparing things. It's just that I can manage comparing 5 or maybe in some cases 10 recordings but I seem to experience either a feeling of being overwhelmed or tend to become indifferent to differences when going beyond that.

With 100 recordings of a Beethoven sonata, did you never have the impression that a particular recording did not add anything of substance to the ones you had heard before? I am afraid I would have had that impression with at least 50, probably with 70 of them.

[bigshot]

What's the point of having 3 or 5 recordings of a piece I do not know well enough to reliably tell which recording I prefer in a comparison, or where I recognize only (seemingly) trivial differences?

I have my collection playing randomly all day long. If I hear something interesting, I can just pick up my iPhone and it displays the conductor and orchestra. I find myself hearing a familiar work and within a minute or two I say to myself "That's Bernstein" or "Must be Abbado". Then I check my phone and I'm usually right. It's a fun game to play.

I probably have 30 Beethoven symphony cycles. When I just had a few, they all sounded the same. But now that I've gotten familiar with a bunch of them, I am much better at discerning what is Beethoven and what is the conductor's interpretation. I think that appreciation of the performance is a level of understanding that you can only really acquire by hearing a lot of performances and comparing them. I also find that being familiar with a wide range of interpretation makes it so I'm not so fixated on finding the one "proper" one. I can see aspects in different interpretations more clearly that might make me appreciate some part of an interpretation that earlier in my listening experience I might have dismissed out of hand.

[Jay F]

TOO MUCH IS NEVER ENOUGH!

The way I deal with quantities of CDs is to rip everything to a media server and box up the physical CDs in the garage. That way, everything in my collection is instantly available and organized without having to turn my head sideways and squint to read tiny text on CD spines. I found that when I went to a server and gave up the CDs, my listening habits changed. Instead of playing a few dozen CDs over and over, I was listening to a much wider swath of my collection. I also rip to complete works by joining tracks, so I can put the server on shuffle and have great music 24/7. It's increased my scope tremendously.

Could you tell us more about your system, please? What do you use as a media server? What program do you keep your music in? Is most of it your own CDs?

Thanks.

[prémont]

....but I still doubt that anyone can really have "a grip" on 100 recordings of a Beethoven sonata or on 30 complete recordings of Bach's organ works.
I think the blind listening comparisons have shown myself and others how well (or often less well) we know music or especially recordings.

You have a good point here - of course it is impossible to remember all the details in 100 different recordings of a Beethoven sonata, but this is at the same time the reason why it is so rewarding to have access to many recordings. You discover new things with each listening. Not only about the music but also concerning the interpretation in question.

And I cannot but fully agree with your point about the blind listening.

[Mandryka]

My opinions and experiences are very much in line with Bigshot's.

[Todd]

With 100 recordings of a Beethoven sonata, did you never have the impression that a particular recording did not add anything of substance to the ones you had heard before?

For individual sonatas, sure, but for whole cycles, I always find something of substance, even in poor ones - I find out what I do not like, what I think does not work.  For select works (LvB sonatas, Debussy and Schubert solo piano, Mozart PCs, some others), I just cannot get enough and I always look forward to hearing something new.  What if the greatest performance is the one I have not heard yet?

[Pat B]

I'm not opposed to culling per se as I have done plenty of it, especially in regards to getting rid of unnecessary duplications, which I send to my friends and so forth. I do, however, feel that there's a reason you have the kind of collection you have in the first place: you simply wanted this or that recording. Whether you feel the need to get rid of something is completely up to you, but it's one thing getting rid of something due to duplication or you simply don't like the music and it's another matter entirely if you're getting rid of something due to space. There are always alternatives for space-saving. Like for example, public storage units or building/adding onto your house (if you live in one and not an apartment). You could also build shelves, which help free up a lot of room.

I assume most of us have shelves or drawers. I replace jewel cases with space-saving sleeves. I guesstimate my classical collection to be about 2500 CDs. I have drawer space for plenty more. (Right now most are boxed up pending a move.) But I am like Jo in that, aside from space and budgetary concerns, I don't see much point in owning a CD that I either won't listen to again, or couldn't distinguish from a different recording in my collection. I'm pretty sure I don't really need 12 versions of Mahler 1 (much as I love that piece) and I definitely don't need 12 versions of The Planets. Maybe our ears are less sensitive than others'. But in many cases the ones I'd be willing to cull are coupled (or part of a box) with something else that I want to keep. Still, I need to do a cull at some point. I have also put myself on a monthly budget which has made me more selective with purchases -- and I still have an abundance of things to listen to!

[Pat B]

And I cannot but fully agree with your point about the blind listening.

Very surprised by that -- you always seem to peg them.