Surprised you don’t own the Borodin Quartet’s set on Melodiya, Jan. This has been my go-to for these SQs for years, although I don’t listen to much Shostakovich these days.
I bought these Quartets with the Pacifica Quartet because of the enthusiastic reviews, I go crazy when I have to have everything in multiple recordings of every interesting piece of music. I am interested in all styles of music where the romantic period in general is at the very back of my interest.
I pay more attention to "modern music" than ever before.
There are periods when I change my listening preferences and mainly listen to early music or start listening to all Bach cantatas again.
I have a good musical memory, but to know all the cantatas after having heard them only once, no that is impossible although it is surprising how much sticks.
When I listen to a mass I try to do that regardless of its liturgical context, only what sounds in relation to the degree to which I am receptive is decisive.
Paul van Nevel would be horrified by the idea that his many recordings of "religious music" are a service act different from strictly the music itself.
So I am looking more for a certain purity in the music that can have many guises, it must be more than just a way of relaxing if it is to transcend a certain everydayness.
You cannot relate to music if you do not also examine yourself and you will find that there is little that is immutable.
Sometimes you are so captivated by the music that it totally throws you off your feet, makes the blood flow faster and you get a "total experience". This is the most beautiful thing that can happen to you and you cannot control it.
You can say, well they are only vibrations, but then you have never really listened or encountered what the sounds suggest or can evoke.
There are psychologists who say that someone who listens to the music of a folk singer can experience the same thing as myself when listening to a Bach cantata.
I hope it's not complete nonsense
