Buying Western Classical Music

avidyarthi

Oistrakh magic is suffusing my listening room. Been listening to his music since late evening. Currently listening to CD9. Mozart's Violin Concerto's 1&2 and Sinfonia Concertante. Mozart was a genius. Ain't no doubt about it. Perhaps the word was invented for him. Oistrakh too is touched with the same genius. I have never heard Mozart played so well before by anyone.
 
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's relatively simpler works would be a good starting point for building a library of western classical music. Mozart has written many works of charming, enchanting, beguiling simplicity. Works which can be played any time of the day, in any kind of environment. Works which can sweep away sorrow, frustration, loneliness and boredom. Mozart is constantly playing in public spaces like airports, elevators, malls and stores all over the world. Most of these are 'muzak' versions, which drain all the beauty and enchantment out of the work. Mozart is constantly being plagiarized in popular music and film scores. Most people who have heard music, have probably heard Mozart in some form or the other, although they might not be aware of it.

Mozart: Serenades: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Karl Bhm, Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, Thomas Brandis: Amazon.co.uk: Music

Mozart: Symphonies Nos.35 "Haffner", 36 "Linzer", 38 "Prager", 39, 40, 41 "Jupiter": Berliner Philharmoniker, Karl Bhm: Amazon.co.uk: Music

Mozart: The Great Piano Concertos Vol. 1: Mitsuko Uchida, English Chamber Orchestra, Jeffrey Tate, Jeffrey Tate: Amazon.co.uk: Music

Mozart: The Great Piano Concertos Vol.2: Mitsuko Uchida, English Chamber Orchestra, Jeffrey Tate, Jeffrey Tate: Amazon.co.uk: Music

Mozart: The Great Piano Concertos, Vol.3: Mitsuko Uchida, English Chamber Orchestra, Jeffrey Tate: Amazon.co.uk: Music

Mozart: The Piano Sonatas: Mitsuko Uchida: Amazon.co.uk: Music

Mozart: Clarinet Concerto / Clarinet Quintet: Jack Brymer, The Allegri String Quartet, Colin Davis, London Symphony Orchestra: Amazon.co.uk: Music

Mozart: Violin Sonatas: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Itzhak Perlman, Daniel Barenboim: Amazon.co.uk: Music

Mozart-Complete String Quintets: Arpad Grecz, Max Lesueur, Grumiax Trio.: Amazon.co.uk: Music

Mozart: The Magic Flute: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Amazon.co.uk: Music

Mozart Concertos for Flute & Harp: Classic Library Series: James Galway, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Amazon.co.uk: Music

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Mozart-Wind...=sr_1_2?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1314330406&sr=1-2

http://www.amazon.co.uk/EMI-Masters...=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1314330447&sr=1-1
 
Searching for Sibelius

Jean Sibelius was born in 1865 in a small town near Helsinki in Finland. In 1885 he abandoned his studies of law and joined the Helsinki Music Institute. This institute now goes by the name of Sibelius Academy.

Sibelius composed seven symphonies, which are considered to be among the greatest symphonies from the Romantic/Nationalist period. He also set to music episodes from the Finnish epic, Kalevala and several poems by Runeberg, the national poet of Finland.

A famous quotation attribute to him: " Whereas most other modern composers are engaged in manufacturing cocktails of every hue and description, I offer the public pure cold water. "

His most famous works include:
Kullervo
Karelia Suites
Lemminkainen
Finlandia
Symphonies 1-7
Lunnotar
The Tempest
Tapiola

From the 1960's-1990's they were several major recordings of the music of Sibelius. Among the best known one's are by Colin Davis/Boston Symphony Orchestra, Lorin Maazel/Weiner Philharmoniker, Paavo Berglund/Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra, Mariss Jansons/Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra, Karajan/Beliner Philharmoniker.

Since the 1990's, the Swedish label BIS Records has gradually been releasing all the works of Jean Sibelius. I first came across the recordings of the Finnish orchestra and conductor, Lahti Symphony Orchestra and Osmo Vanska on You Tube. I was bowled over by the music. I have heard many versions of Sibelius but his music has never taken center stage. Currently I am more interested in music composed between 1850-1950, and the sound of the Lahiti Symphony Orchestra changed my perception of Sibelius. Many years ago I had visited Finland and the Lapland region. Sibelius, Vanska and Lahti evoke the mystic beauty of the lapland region in their spectacular music. I feel like going back to Finland :)

BIS Records

Sibelius: The Complete Symphonies: Jean Sibelius, Osmo Vanska, Lahti Symphony Orchestra: Amazon.co.uk: Music

Sibelius: Edition Vol.12 (The Symphonies): Lahti Symphony Orchestra, Jean Sibelius, Osmo Vnsk, Jaakko Kuusisto: Amazon.co.uk: Music

Sibelius: Tone Poems: Lahti Symphony Orchestra, Osmo Vanska, Jean Sibelius: Amazon.co.uk: Music

Sibelius (The Essential): Love Derwinger, Stina Ekblad, Bengt Forsberg, Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra, Folke Grasbeck, Anna Kreetta Gribajcevic, Monica Groop, Mari Anne Haggander, Tommi Hakala, Juhani Hapuli, Hynnin, Jean Sibelius, n/a: Amazon.co.uk:

Sibelius: The Symphonies; Tone Poems: Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra, Neeme Jrvi: Amazon.co.uk: Music

http://www.classiclive.com/Orchestras/Lahti-Symphony-Orchestra

SIBELIUS -- The Breaking of the Ice on the Oulu River -- Lahti SO - YouTube
 
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@ Ajay 124: Have you listened Rimsky Korsakov, Mikhail Glazunov, Georges Bizet, Georg Phillip Telemann works? From what I observed seems you are incline towards violin concerto... Schumann, Scriabin, Brahms and Edvard Grieg Piano concertos are worth to hear as well besides Mozart, Beethoven, Rachmaninoff, etc... Concerto for Mandolin and Lute from Vivaldi is worth to hear as well...
 
ylesmana

Currently I don't have any music of Telemann, Vivaldi, Albinoni or Montverdi because I don't listen to Baroque music all that much. I have all the major works of Bach, Handel and Scarlatti, but I am more into orchestral music these days. I have the orchestral music of Bizet and Rossini and they are good for an 'easy listening' session. I am not into opera and don't have the music of Puccini, Verdi, Donizetti etc. I don't particularly care for Wagner or Richard Strauss. I don't listen to choral music, oratorios or masses. I have a few works by British and American composers like Aaron Copland, George Gershwin, Charles Ives, Edward Elgar, Vaughan Williams and Benjamin Britten. They are nice to listen to but I am not particularly fond of any of these composers. I have most of the major works by the rest of the well known European composers.

So what do I like these days?

Mahler most of all. I have multiple recordings of all his symphonies and listen to them all the time. Last night I finished of with Symphony 1 by Guilini and 2 by Klemperer. Today morning I began with 3 by Haitink, 4 by Boulez and currently 6 by Abbado is playing. Therefore Mahler rules!

I have most of the works by Beethoven, Mozart, Schubert, Haydn, Brahms, Schumann, Chopin, Dvorak, Mendelssohn, Strauss Jr. and listen to their music frequently. David Oistrakh and Jascha Heifetz for the violin works and Sviatoslav Richter, Vladimir Horowitz, Murray Perahia, Maurizio Pollini, Emil Gilels, Vladimir Ashkenazy and Martha Argerich for the piano works. I have had an overdose of Karajan, Bernstein, Barenboim, Menuhin, Perlman, Zukerman, Berlin Philharmonic and Vienna Philharmonic in the past. They are all very good but currently I would rather listen to a new set of interpreters.

My favorite orchestra is the Royal Concertgebouw from Amsterdam and The Mariinsky from St. Petersburg. Recently I was very impressed with the Lahti Symphony Orchestra from Finland. The conductors I prefer listening to are Pierre Boulez, Valery Gergiev, Bernard Haitink, Otto Klemperer, Claudio Abbado and Evgeny Svetlanov. I would love to listen to Wilhelm Furtwangler and Yuri Temirkanov when somebody manages to clean up their historical recordings.

In recent times I have bought comprehensive collections of Sergei Prokofiev, Pyotr Tchaikovsky, Dmitri Shostakovich, Igor Stravinski, Sergei Rachmaninov, Rimski Korsakov, Modest Mussorgsky, Alexander Borodin, Mili Balakirev, Mikhail Glinka, Jean Sibelius, Claude Debussy, Maurice Ravel, Anton Bruckner, Anton Webern, Olivier Messiaen, Arnold Schoenberg, Gyorgy Ligetti, Leos Janacek, Carl Neilsen, Bohuslav Martinu, Bedrich Smetana, Eric Satie, Julian Bream, Andre Segovia among others. Therefore plenty of music to dip into!
 
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I have never heard Mozart played so well before by anyone.

Agreed ...
I too have reached the 9th CD. Bogged down with office chores of late, so, am not able to spend sufficient time.

Would try out the Oistrakh CDs with my vintage Sony FS this time around. Lets see the difference. Currently, am using the teeny weeny JBL speakers (with Topping amp) with them. The Sonys being with more laid back signature ... don't know how Oistrakh with sound there. Anyway, am very pleased with what is being belted out from the JBL .... am more into clean, clear mid and highs and shun the bass bit as much possible.
 
avidyarthi

Many Oistrakh recordings seem to be closely miked, with his violin holding center stage, and the orchestra sounding recessed and in the background. A small sweet sounding system will be able to convey the magic of his music. Chamber music sounds nice on small systems. But orchestral works definitely require clean sounding, musical and powerful amps and speakers. In my 400 sq feet room, a continuous power of 250 wpc/4ohms, both channels driven, is the bare minimum I would be happy with. Of course you cannot go only by the specs. But I do give a lot of weightage to power specs and the weight and build quality of the amp and speakers.
 
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Ajay124

Good to know your favourite composers...I have all of them (Beethoven, Mozart, Schumann, Brahms, Bartholdy, J S Bach, Anna Magdalena Bach, Scriabin, Glazunov, Glinka, Korsakov, Suppe, Bizet, Rossini, Berlioz, Weber, Wagner, Strauss, Verdi, Schubert, Mussorgsky, Elgar, Grieg, Handel, Boyce, Pleyel, Chopin, Sibelius, Bruckner, Rodrigo, Carl Orff, Ravel, etc) basically almost complete (1000 CDs in my room :))...

For Piano, Violin works I listen to all of pianist as everybody has different character, strength and weakness.

For Guitar my favourites guitarists are: Pepe Romero, Angel Romero, Celedonio Romero, Narciso Yepes, Andres Segovia, John Williams, Xue Fei Yang, Kaori Muraji, Julian Bream, Paco de Lucia and David Russell.

I dont listen to opera, Chorus (Except the Carmina Burana), Oratorio Masses as well except the overtures that is written by those composers for opera.
 
There are certain recording now for classical music that produced a very good sound quality...some of them are recorded in XRCD, HQCD, SACD/SHM and very limited too..for instance Esoteric does produced several CD and limited to 300 copies all over the world..but of course the price is fantastic starting from 55-100 USD per CD. I have few of them (from ESOTERIC) and sound is definitely worth every single penny. Deustche Gramaphone, Decca, Hyperion, Chandos, EMI are providing a very good quality too...
 
ylesmana

"Audiophile" CD's are not my thing. I believe they are more about 'sound' and less about music. Basically they seem to be following the example of HI FI hardware, which is essentially a low volume/high margin business. A limited edition 300 CD release at 50-100$ may be a 'limited' release because the niche label releasing the music knows that they would not be able to sell more copies. Calling it a 'limited edition' may be nothing more than advertising spin.

The fact that is underplayed in many of these CD's and high resolution downloads is that the musicians being hired to perform the music are relatively unknown performers. You will never find an Angela Hewitt, Yundi Li, Pierre-Laurent Aimard or Michael Tilson Thomas on an 'audiophile' CD. The small labels would never be able to afford them. What you normally get are university orchestras, academics wanting to become musicians, church choirs, amateur musicians taking their first baby step into the pro arena. The composers name is printed in bold, in order to compensate for the paucity of star power among the musicians. Therefore a buyer gets a nicely packaged CD, which may or may not have exceptional sound quality, but the magic of great music is missing. Niche labels work with limited resources, personnel and equipment. Can they really offer better sound than a recent 10$ SACD from DG, EMI, Decca or Chandos? Since you have all these labels, I would be interested in hearing your views on the relative sound quality/quality of musicians used/pricing of these labels as compared to limited edition issues.

These are simply my views which may be wrong. I have never bought or heard such CD's, because the roster of musicians they present has never interested me. I have reposed my faith in audiophile hardware and feel good about it. But I cannot accept audiophile software at face value. At least not in classical music. For great sound and great music, I would rather go for something like, the Valery Gergiev/LSO recording of Prokofiev's Romeo & Juliet. At 9.99 pounds for a set of two hybrid SACD's this is great value for money. The Amazon link also connects to the live performance on You Tube. Check it out.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Prokofiev-R...CE9C/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1315016340&sr=8-1
 
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Dear Mr Ajay124,

SACD disc has 2 type, one is hybrid SACD and the other is SACD SHM...when SACD disc play in normal cd player what you get is the normal sound quality of CD but when it plays on SACD player in particular if using DAC Transport then the difference is noted..it will more detailed, clean and softer like vinyl sound. CD in my opinion has "crunchy" sound compare to vinyl (I often listen vinyl).

Regarding the limited edition issues, I believe it just the company wants to do it that way so that it will look more high class, but the technology they are using are the same.

I still found vinyl is better and over CD in terms of sound quality and CD DAC Transport definitely is above all remaining normal CD player but again it depends on which brand/model, some of SACD player without DAC Transport are also provide a very good sound quality like AMR, T+A, Burmester (not sure if you ever heard this brand before)
 
ylesmana

Do you find any difference between the sound quality of hybrid SACD and SACD SHM. I have hybrid SACD's of Beethoven's symphonies by Bernard Haitink/LSO and a few Shostakovich symphonies by Gergiev/Mariinsky. The LSO set is distinguished more by the different approach that Haitink has taken to Beethoven's symphonies as compared to the Karajan set with which I am more familiar. Haitink's version is gentler and softer (mozartian) as compared to the dramatic and heroic (wagnerian) version by Karajan. The sound quality is good on my SACD player. There is plenty of depth and detail, but I find something lacking as compared to my best red book CD recordings. Perhaps the reason is not the technology but the acoustics of the Barbican Hall where many LSO live performances are recorded. Barbican's acoustics were supposed to be quite bad before their 2004 renovation. The Beethoven set was recorded post renovation, but it is possible that the sparkle which I found missing in the recording is more due to the acoustics of Barbican.

The Gergiev/Mariinsky recordings have everything that an audiophile or a music-o-phile could desire. The spine tingling and electrifying music of Shostakovich. Superb sound and dynamics with oodles of detail, sparkle, bite and slam. The music traverses from 'pin drop' silence to startling, ominous highs in a matter of seconds. It is difficult to set a volume for listening for these recordings. I constantly have the remote in hand while listening to Shostakovich. The quieter passages need to be heard at two-o-clock volumes, but I quickly scale back the volume before the tsunami of the louder passages is unleashed. The solid metal grills of my speakers have fallen off while listening to Mahler! With Shostakovich I am scared that a tweeter or a mid range driver may suddenly fly out of the speaker and land in my lap.

For the moment my Vienna Acoustic speakers are holding up well. Maybe because they come from the same land which gave birth to Gustav Mahler :)
 
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Ajay124,

Yes, the SACD SHM sound alive, open, airy, dynamic, clean and detail. It might be true to listen Shostakovich you need to adjust the volume back and forward (I do not have any collection from Shostakovich since most Russian composers does not attached to my style except Rachmaninoff, Scriabin, Tchaikovsky, Glinka, Korsakov).

I am not too sure if you are using vibration damping and power conditioning for all your equipment...Also the socket wall must be change too...you cannot use the normal socket wall for this high end audio since the noise and humming sound is there (you may not notice what is that)...but since the voltage is up and down..this will impact your sound quality.

The most important thing is use the pure straight interconnect and speaker cable without additional thing in the middle. :)...
 
Ajay124,

.Also the socket wall must be change too...you cannot use the normal socket wall for this high end audio since the noise and humming sound is there (you may not notice what is that)...but since the voltage is up and down..this will impact your sound quality.

The most important thing is use the pure straight interconnect and speaker cable without additional thing in the middle. :)...

i think he has noticed it...
see here..
http://www.hifivision.com/audio-video-cables/17044-power-cords.html
 
It is true that voltage fluctuations add noise and hum to the system. I realized how much noise had earlier been present in my system, after I started using one phase exclusively for supplying power to the online UPS. The online UPS outputs a constant 230V into 4mm power cables leading directly to power sockets behind the audio rack. I expect there would be further improvement if I was using Furutech/Oyaide power sockets and male/female plugs, but I find them them too expensive. At the moment I am completely satisfied with my system. I would like to upgrade the speaker cables but the rest of the system is perfect. I am not looking at anymore upgrades. I have 500+ CD's of western classical music and I believe that is enough music to last a lifetime.

ylesmana

The most important thing is use pure straight interconnect and speaker cable without additional thing in the middle :)

Are you referring to the filters/black boxes which Transparent Audio uses on their interconnects and speakers cables? Do you think they hamper the signal being passed through? I am very happy with Transparent Audio, but I don't have any other speaker cables or interconnects with which I could compare them.
 
The Furutech GTX D-Rhodium, GTX Wall Plate are definitely worth to buy (I am using it and gave me a very stable and silent move). Is it costly? Yes, but if you are a stereo player then money should be ready. For your power conditioner I cannot give comment on it but looking out your systems, I do not think UPS power conditioner is comparable...you may consider ISOTEK Power conditioner, PS Audio or Shunyata Research. My personally using ISOTEK.

Regarding speaker cable, yes I meant the filtering black box in the middle..I am trying not to mention directly....of course for many people, they think the sound that is being produced really a sonic boom and improve their system a lot but basically it is already adding too many 'spices' on it... For many people they do like the sound but for me it is not natural...of course you cannot compare it with other cables since they are using too many spices...but for me I like natural sound and just to name few, XLO, DH Labs Silver Sonic are my favourite one...of course I recommend only the reference series only which cost above 3000 USD/meter. If you like the sound from your speaker cable do not change it...please go ahead..
 
3000USD per meter for speaker cables is clearly not in my budget. When hi fi starts acquiring price tags with too many zeros, I mentally switch off from it. Personally I don't find high prices impressive. Beyond a point I am not interested in hi fi if the price stop making sense. I would rather invest my money in real estate than in chasing ephemeral audio illusions :)
 
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