DG's already deleting some of the "20/21" series
Christopher Culver
some of the best recordings of contemporary music around, but it looks
like they are already deleting releases from their catalogue. Take a
look at:
http://www.deutschegrammophon.com/webseries/?ID=20-21&PRODUCT_NR=4775380
Notice that Lieberson's "Raising the Gaze" is no longer listed, nor is
Eotvos' "Trois soeurs", Berio's "Coro", Boesmann's "Wintermarchen",
Brouwer's "Rara", or Siegfried Palm's "Intercommunicazione".
Searching for these in DG's general catalogue confirms that they are
gone.
It's sad that these are now out of print, especially considering that
the last three releases were reissues of long out-of-print material.
--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com
Matthew B. Tepper
the following letters to be typed in
news:87r70c6...@aura.christopherculver.com:
> Notice that Lieberson's "Raising the Gaze" is no longer listed,
Chris Roberts to Peter Lieberson: "Sorry about your wife. By the way, we're
deleting our recording of your music."
--
Matthew B. Tepper: WWW, science fiction, classical music, ducks!
My personal home page -- http://home.earthlink.net/~oy/index.html
My main music page --- http://home.earthlink.net/~oy/berlioz.html
To write to me, do for my address what Androcles did for the lion
I ask you to judge me by the enemies I have made. ~ FDR (attrib.)
Peter T. Daniels
Christopher Culver wrote:
> Deutsche Grammophon's "20/21" and "Echo 20/21" series have provided
> some of the best recordings of contemporary music around, but it looks
> like they are already deleting releases from their catalogue.
Then go to Tower (or Berkshire Music?) and pick them up as cutouts.
Christopher Culver
> Then go to Tower (or Berkshire Music?) and pick them up as cutouts.
I've never seen a "20/21" release as a cutout. In fact, I've never
seen any DG release as a cutout at the Tower stores in Chicago.
And what the deletion from the catalogue means is that when all copies
are sold, there won't be *any more left*. No more will be produced. So
what does someone who develops an interest in, say, Lieberson's music
five years from now do? He'll pay two or three times the former price
for a rare used copy.
William Sommerwerck
tomdeacon
Sad, yes, but understandable.
They would still be in the catalogue if someone were buying them, of
course.
The 20/21 series is very costly to produce, sales are poor to
catastrophic, and the constituency for such music tiny and without much
influence. (The possible exception being Boulez, of course. If they
want his Mahler, they have to do this and that)
As I am fond of repeating - although my voice is almost hoarse in the
process - the record business is a business.
TD
William Sommerwerck
> in the process -- the record business is a business.
Agreed.
The problem is that the classical-music "division" too-often isn't run as a
business. The classical moguls seem to assume that customers will rush to
purchase overpriced products that haven't been properly promoted.
Matthew B. Tepper
the following letters to be typed in
> Agreed.
>
> The problem is that the classical-music "division" too-often isn't run as
> a business. The classical moguls seem to assume that customers will rush
> to purchase overpriced products that haven't been properly promoted.
And then, when the overpriced products sit on the shelves, they are beset
with feelings of puzzlement and anger, conclude that the stupid customers
have screwed them again, and use that as another excuse to concentrate on
re-re-re-re-reissues which require little effort nor imagination.
Kirk McElhearn
>> The problem is that the classical-music "division" too-often isn't run as
>> a business. The classical moguls seem to assume that customers will rush
>> to purchase overpriced products that haven't been properly promoted.
>
> And then, when the overpriced products sit on the shelves, they are
> beset with feelings of puzzlement and anger, conclude that the stupid
> customers have screwed them again, and use that as another excuse to
> concentrate on re-re-re-re-reissues which require little effort nor
> imagination.
You're always railing about this, but things are going to change very
soon. With digital downloads, there's no reason for any recording to go
out of print. And, yes, you'll be able to buy them in lossless formats
soon too.
Kirk
--
Read my blog, Kirkville
http://www.mcelhearn.com
Gerard
> On 2006-07-23 16:30:52 +0200, "Matthew B. Tepper" <oy兀earthlink.net>
> said:
>
> > > The problem is that the classical-music "division" too-often
> > > isn't run as a business. The classical moguls seem to assume that
> > > customers will rush to purchase overpriced products that haven't
> > > been properly promoted.
> >
> > And then, when the overpriced products sit on the shelves, they are
> > beset with feelings of puzzlement and anger, conclude that the
> > stupid customers have screwed them again, and use that as another
> > excuse to concentrate on re-re-re-re-reissues which require little
> > effort nor imagination.
>
> You're always railing about this,
I think that 50 % of his posts are about this.
The rest is signature.
William Sommerwerck
> soon. With digital downloads, there's no reason for any recording to go
> out of print. And, yes, you'll be able to buy them in lossless formats
> soon too.
I hope so. Though the gentleman from Sony indicated we won't be seeing SACD
recordings, whether stereo or multii-ch. This is unfortunate.
Last night I downloaded the 330MB trial version of Photoshop CS2. It took
about 15 minutes. So a full CD in WAV format shouldn't be a problem.
Matthew B. Tepper
letters to be typed in news:44c38f30$0$877$ba4a...@news.orange.fr:
> On 2006-07-23 16:30:52 +0200, "Matthew B. Tepper" <oyž@earthlink.net>
> said:
>
>>> The problem is that the classical-music "division" too-often isn't run
>>> as a business. The classical moguls seem to assume that customers will
>>> rush to purchase overpriced products that haven't been properly
>>> promoted.
>>
>> And then, when the overpriced products sit on the shelves, they are
>> beset with feelings of puzzlement and anger, conclude that the stupid
>> customers have screwed them again, and use that as another excuse to
>> concentrate on re-re-re-re-reissues which require little effort nor
>> imagination.
>
> You're always railing about this, but things are going to change very
> soon. With digital downloads, there's no reason for any recording to go
> out of print. And, yes, you'll be able to buy them in lossless formats
> soon too.
And I suppose that after years of mismanagement as I've so often noted,
those download sites are going to have perfect search engines where you can
find exactly what you want, complete with performer attributions, composer
and work names, etc. Just like we have now. Yeah, right.
The "moguls" have still got to clean up their act, whether the delivery
method is on pressed CDs, CDRs, or downloads.
Kirk McElhearn
<gizzle...@comcast.net> said:
It doesn't need to be WAV - FLAC or other lossless formats are fine and
are half as big.
William Sommerwerck
> are fine and half as big.
True, but will they play on a burned CD? (I assume you can expand them to
WAV files.)
Kirk McElhearn
<gizzle...@comcast.net> said:
Sure. Lots of music is already sold in FLAC format, mostly live music
by bands such as the Grateful Dead, but Magnatune (www.magnatune.com)
sells classical music in that format. There are free programs that
decompress the files, and you can then burn them to CD.
Steven de Mena
"Christopher Culver" <crcu...@christopherculver.com> wrote in message
news:87u0583...@aura.christopherculver.com...
> "Peter T. Daniels" <gram...@verizon.net> writes:
>> Then go to Tower (or Berkshire Music?) and pick them up as cutouts.
>
> I've never seen a "20/21" release as a cutout. In fact, I've never
> seen any DG release as a cutout at the Tower stores in Chicago.
>
> And what the deletion from the catalogue means is that when all copies
> are sold, there won't be *any more left*.
It also means not enougn people were interested.
Is it so hard to understand these guys are running a business?
Steve
Steven de Mena
"William Sommerwerck" <gizzle...@comcast.net> wrote in message
news:xMSdnZ7o4-w2B17Z...@comcast.com...
posting in a lossless format instead. I could perhaps understand an ISO
image format, which would preserve the tracks and spacing *perfectly*, but
not individual WAV files.
Steve
Steven de Mena
into an identical (not "close" or "almost identical") file as the original
[WAV].
Steve
Steven de Mena
"Matthew B. Tepper" <oyş@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:Xns98095D838A2...@207.217.125.201...
> Kirk McElhearn <kir...@gmail.com> appears to have caused the following
> letters to be typed in news:44c38f30$0$877$ba4a...@news.orange.fr:
>
>> said:
>>
>>>> The problem is that the classical-music "division" too-often isn't run
>>>> as a business. The classical moguls seem to assume that customers will
>>>> rush to purchase overpriced products that haven't been properly
>>>> promoted.
>>>
>>> And then, when the overpriced products sit on the shelves, they are
>>> beset with feelings of puzzlement and anger, conclude that the stupid
>>> customers have screwed them again, and use that as another excuse to
>>> concentrate on re-re-re-re-reissues which require little effort nor
>>> imagination.
>>
>> You're always railing about this, but things are going to change very
>> soon. With digital downloads, there's no reason for any recording to go
>> out of print. And, yes, you'll be able to buy them in lossless formats
>> soon too.
>
> And I suppose that after years of mismanagement as I've so often noted,
> those download sites are going to have perfect search engines where you
> can
> find exactly what you want, complete with performer attributions, composer
> and work names, etc. Just like we have now. Yeah, right.
Exactly what kind of "search engine" do they have in Tower Classical Annex,
for example?
You have to physically walk around to each composer or collection section
and manually thumb through the CDs. If it's a CD with symphonies by two
different composers you need to check both sections. And what about those
CDs under the shelves by the floor? Maybe it's there? Or maybe it's
mis-filed......
I think most of the online searches are better than this.
Steve
Gerard
> >
> Posting CDs in WAV format would be foolish when you can save so much
> space posting in a lossless format instead.
WAV format is lossless too. You mean here: lossless _compressed_ format.
("flac" = free lossless audio compression)
Steven de Mena
"Gerard" <ghend...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:44c3bca0$0$22906$dbd4...@news.wanadoo.nl...
When you say "Lossless" that is what is generally meant - that it is
compressed.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lossless#Audio_compression
Your post was a complete waste of space.
Steve
Gerard
> "Gerard" <ghend...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
> news:44c3bca0$0$22906$dbd4...@news.wanadoo.nl...
> > Steven de Mena wrote:
> > > >
> > > Posting CDs in WAV format would be foolish when you can save so
> > > much space posting in a lossless format instead.
> >
> > WAV format is lossless too. You mean here: lossless _compressed_
> > format. ("flac" = free lossless audio compression)
>
> When you say "Lossless" that is what is generally meant - that it is
> compressed.
Maybe that's true, or clear for you. But apparantly some people don't know all
about it, or don't know everything you know.
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lossless#Audio_compression
>
> Your post was a complete waste of space.
>
Thanks.
Compared to so many other posts here, it was only a waste of little space.
david...@aol.com
tomdeacon wrote:
> The 20/21 series is very costly to produce, sales are poor to
> catastrophic,
Moreso than any other recordings???????
> and the constituency for such music tiny and without much
> influence. (The possible exception being Boulez, of course. If they
> want his Mahler, they have to do this and that)
This is another subtle Deacon slander. Boulez's DG recordings of
Boulez's music sell much better than the Deacon lets on, and DG would
delete them as quickly as they've deleted Peter Lieberson's if they
didn't. At the Clark Street Tower in Chicago, the 20 best selling
classical releases of the week are on display near the cash register:
eight months after Boulez's new Marteau was initially released, it was
still in the top 5. I also know that DG was surprised by how well
...explosante/fixe... sold, and now, after a decade in print at full
price, DG has re-issued it at mid-price.
..explosante/fixe... may not sell as well in any given week as all the
available recordings of Beethoven's 9th, but in competition with any
one of them it does well enough to stay in the catalogue.
-david gable
david...@aol.com
tomdeacon wrote:
> As I am fond of repeating - although my voice is almost hoarse in the
> process - the record business is a business.
No need to make yourself hoarse. Everybody here is well aware that the
record business is a business, and our feckless protests and
lamentations are directed as much at the culture generally as at that
specific (and often deserving) target, the record companies.
Your loyalty to the majors is touching, Tom. I can only hope that
Philips repays you in kind by paying for a coffin adorned with the
Philips logo when the sad day comes for you.
-david gable
Allen
As are practically all of his posts. He joined the group recently and
has done little but complain ever since.
Allen
Ian Pace
<david...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:1153682988....@i3g2000cwc.googlegroups.com...
the staunchest defender of the virtues of market economics.
Ian
Steven de Mena
"Ian Pace" <i...@ianpace.com> wrote in message
news:4eQwg.14379$u%3.6...@newsfe1-gui.ntli.net...
Is he really being the "staunchest defender of the virtues of market
economics" or just applying the same rules of economics that all of us would
apply to any other business?
Steve
Matthew B. Tepper
following letters to be typed in news:1153682988.440705.91540
@i3g2000cwc.googlegroups.com:
> No need to make yourself hoarse. Everybody here is well aware that the
> record business is a business, and our feckless protests and
> lamentations are directed as much at the culture generally as at that
> specific (and often deserving) target, the record companies.
>
> Your loyalty to the majors is touching, Tom. I can only hope that
> Philips repays you in kind by paying for a coffin adorned with the
> Philips logo when the sad day comes for you.
And of course there will be a singer to perform Schubert's "Ave Maria" in
memory of the recently departed. Needless to say, it will have to be
Philips' biggest attraction: Andrea Bocelli.
Matthew B. Tepper
following letters to be typed in
We're talking about different kinds of experiences. A physical in-store
search is fun in its own way, and if Tower has, say, sixty different
Beethoven 5ths you can go flipflipflipflipflip and you've seen just what
they are (particularly easy if you're familiar with the cover designs).
Compare and contrast with Amazon.com showing you fifteen titles, and then
you have to scroll or page down to get to the button, and click, and see
fifteen more titles, and then, etc. etc.
And that's only if you've been lucky enough to find a way to get it to show
you just the CDs with that specific Beethoven symphony on them, and not
EVERY single CD with any Beethoven symphony (or individual movement from
same, as on "The Most Wonderfullest Classical Album ... EVER!" or "The Only
Beethoven CD You Need, You Dumb Yuppie" and other things such as these).
And after all that, you just might see a CD's contents listed with all the
movement markings given as though they were song titles, and composer names
entirely missing. Jeez.
Besides, some online sites have search engines which are usable. And then
there's Arkivmusic, which features a drilldown menu of astonishing power.
Many of the individual listings contain useful information, such as the
recording dates, collaborating artists, and sometimes even timings.
What I object to specifically are the iTunes classical search engines,
which are still inadequate to the task. Worse are the ones (much more
common) which only permit "Artist" and "Title," because the designers don't
think there should ever be any reason to want more.
If we are truly at a crossroads, then let us have those search engines
which will be adequate to the cause, not the crappy ones we usually see.
Matthew B. Tepper
> Is he really being the "staunchest defender of the virtues of market
> economics" or just applying the same rules of economics that all of us
> would apply to any other business?
I could venture my own opinion of what he is being, but it would involve
some sort of colorful terminology to indicate the south side of a horse
that is facing north.
William Sommerwerck
> ...explosante/fixe... sold
Could it be that it was an entertaining, involving work, that was perhaps
promoted by word of mouth?
Steven de Mena
"Matthew B. Tepper" <oy兀earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:Xns9809847C26C...@207.217.125.201...
> Besides, some online sites have search engines which are usable. And then
> there's Arkivmusic, which features a drilldown menu of astonishing power.
Read as "they don't have a search engine".
> Many of the individual listings contain useful information, such as the
> recording dates, collaborating artists, and sometimes even timings.
>
> What I object to specifically are the iTunes classical search engines,
> which are still inadequate to the task. Worse are the ones (much more
> common) which only permit "Artist" and "Title," because the designers
> don't
> think there should ever be any reason to want more.
I am impressed with how iTunes uses the "Composer" ID3-tag, which is rarely
used and not even accessible in many ripping programs (such as the
much-touted "EAC"). This field helps a lot in Classical searches.
> If we are truly at a crossroads, then let us have those search engines
> which will be adequate to the cause, not the crappy ones we usually see.
Search engines usually only get better, not worse, so I am not too
concerned.
Steve
david...@aol.com
Steven de Mena wrote:
> Is [Tom Deacon] really being the "staunchest defender of the virtues of market
> economics" or just applying the same rules of economics that all of us would
> apply to any other business?
Tom is very defensive when it comes to the majors. He isn't simply the
dispassionate voice of reason pointing out that the classical music biz
is a business. He's proud of the majors' successes, and he excuses
their failures by pointing out that the biz is a business.
As for "any other business," I would compare the majors today to the
majors through about 1980. Smaller entities run by people interested
in the product they sell do things differently from larger entities
interested in the bottom line. Smaller entities are also more
flexible. There's a big difference between a Columbia Records headed
by Peter Lieberson's father, Goddard Lieberson, and a Sony Records that
is only one department within a much vaster corporate entity.
At one point there were negotiations between the CSO and DG for a
recording of Elliott Carter's Cello Concerto with Yo-Yo Ma, Daniel
Barenboim, and the CSO, who had just given its premiere. In the end,
negotiations broke down, and DG wouldn't record it. Bridge Records, on
the other hand, somehow managed the feat of recording it with Fred
Sherry, Oliver Knussen, and the BBC SO. So there are businesses and
there are businesses.
I should add that Bridge never deletes anything.
-david gable
david...@aol.com
Delicious it is. I bought at least a dozen copies myself to give as
gifts to people I was trying to convert.
-david gable
Peter T. Daniels
Christopher Culver wrote:
> "Peter T. Daniels" <gram...@verizon.net> writes:
> > Then go to Tower (or Berkshire Music?) and pick them up as cutouts.
>
> I've never seen a "20/21" release as a cutout. In fact, I've never
> seen any DG release as a cutout at the Tower stores in Chicago.
Have they changed _that_ much since my day? (When I visited Clark St.
and Wabash last summer, they'd rearranged everything, and the staff
were surlier with age, but they didn't seem noticeably different. Tower
Outlet in NY is a shadow of its former self, having been dispossessed
by NYU and squeezed into the main store on Broadway & E 4.)
> And what the deletion from the catalogue means is that when all copies
> are sold, there won't be *any more left*. No more will be produced. So
> what does someone who develops an interest in, say, Lieberson's music
> five years from now do? He'll pay two or three times the former price
> for a rare used copy.
The price of anything depends on the demand.
If demand existed, they wouldn't be going out of print; why would you
expect more people to want them five years hence than want them now?
And if there should be a sudden demand spurt, then DG, or whoever owns
Universal by then, will reissue them cheaper.
Peter T. Daniels
Aha! The New York Times puts an asterisk by items in the best-seller
lists that give evidence of "bulk purchases."
Peter T. Daniels
david...@aol.com wrote:
> Steven de Mena wrote:
>
> > Is [Tom Deacon] really being the "staunchest defender of the virtues of market
> > economics" or just applying the same rules of economics that all of us would
> > apply to any other business?
>
> Tom is very defensive when it comes to the majors. He isn't simply the
> dispassionate voice of reason pointing out that the classical music biz
> is a business. He's proud of the majors' successes, and he excuses
> their failures by pointing out that the biz is a business.
>
> As for "any other business," I would compare the majors today to the
> majors through about 1980. Smaller entities run by people interested
> in the product they sell do things differently from larger entities
> interested in the bottom line. Smaller entities are also more
> flexible. There's a big difference between a Columbia Records headed
> by Peter Lieberson's father, Goddard Lieberson, and a Sony Records that
> is only one department within a much vaster corporate entity.
A while back, I caused a furor on the Cornell Alumni List (mostly
populated by young'uns) by asserting that a business exists to provide
a good or service so well that it makes a profit. The dogma these days
it that a business exists to make a profit.
That former Harvard business professor who was a teacher of GWB (and
frequently reminisces about what a bad student he was), who is now at
City University of New York's business school (Bernard Baruch College),
whose name (Japanese) I can never remember, says this change in
attitude happened in the early 70s.
Steven de Mena
<david...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:1153686119....@i3g2000cwc.googlegroups.com...
> At one point there were negotiations between the CSO and DG for a
> recording of Elliott Carter's Cello Concerto with Yo-Yo Ma, Daniel
> Barenboim, and the CSO, who had just given its premiere. In the end,
> negotiations broke down, and DG wouldn't record it. Bridge Records, on
> the other hand, somehow managed the feat of recording it with Fred
> Sherry, Oliver Knussen, and the BBC SO. So there are businesses and
> there are businesses.
>
> I should add that Bridge never deletes anything.
>
> -david gable
>
Don't you think the BBC Symphony was a LOT less expensive to record than the
Chicago Symphony? And wasn't that CD a co-production with the BBC?
Steve
Michael Haslam
> Christopher Culver wrote:
>
> > And what the deletion from the catalogue means is that when all copies
> > are sold, there won't be *any more left*. No more will be produced. So
> > what does someone who develops an interest in, say, Lieberson's music
> > five years from now do? He'll pay two or three times the former price
> > for a rare used copy.
>
> The price of anything depends on the demand.
>
> If demand existed, they wouldn't be going out of print; why would you
> expect more people to want them five years hence than want them now?
> And if there should be a sudden demand spurt, then DG, or whoever owns
> Universal by then, will reissue them cheaper.
If only it were that simple! ISTM that record companies (if that's what
they are these days) have lost interest in the long term. I suppose that
40 years ago, if your company produced the only recording of, say,
Pelleas, or Beethoven 9, or the Rasumovsky Quartets, you were guaranteed
sales in perpetuity. Once the record companies started competing on
repertoire that economic model became redundant and the only "gimmick"
was the performer/performance and if it only sold 10000 in the first
year it wasn't worth repressing.
--
MJHaslam
Remove accidentals to obtain correct e-address
"Can't you show a little restraint?" - Dr. David Tholen
Michael Haslam
>
> Don't you think the BBC Symphony was a LOT less expensive to record than the
> Chicago Symphony? And wasn't that CD a co-production with the BBC?
Why would it be MUCH cheaper to record the BBCSO than the CSO, speaking
purely commercially?
tomdeacon
david...@aol.com wrote:
> tomdeacon wrote:
>
> > The 20/21 series is very costly to produce, sales are poor to
> > catastrophic,
>
> Moreso than any other recordings?
Well, yes, as a matter of fact. Naturally, they have fewer outlets
than, say, Beethoven would, as many stores refuse to carry contemporary
music which doesn't sell.
> > and the constituency for such music tiny and without much
> > influence. (The possible exception being Boulez, of course. If they
> > want his Mahler, they have to do this and that)
>
> This is another subtle Deacon slander.
Subtle?
You jest. I would say it was quite direct.
As for slander, you exaggerate.
> Boulez's DG recordings of Boulez's music sell much better than the Deacon lets on, and DG would delete them as quickly as they've deleted Peter Lieberson's if they
> didn't.
To say that Boulez sells better than Peter Lieberson is not really
saying a great deal, David. Lieberson probably doesn't sell at all.
Of course there is a constituency for Boulez and his music, but it is
small.
> I also know that DG was surprised by how well ...explosante/fixe... sold, and now, after a decade in print at full price, DG has re-issued it at mid-price.
Who spoke for DG?
> ..explosante/fixe... may not sell as well in any given week as all the
> available recordings of Beethoven's 9th, but in competition with any
> one of them it does well enough to stay in the catalogue.
Barely. And that is the point.
This is not a value judgment, David, but simply a statement of fact.
I doubt very much that Boulez' music would sell to Pat Robertson and
his fellow Moral Majority members if Jesus Christ Himself was
conducting the Heavenly Philharmonic!!!
TD
Stephen Worth
> > As I am fond of repeating - although my voice is almost hoarse in the
> > process - the record business is a business.
I don't buy records... I buy music. If the music sucks, I
don't care whether accountants and lawyers think it's
wonderful. Perhaps you keep repeating yourself because
no one really cares. We're all music lovers here, not
business lovers. Our only interest in that topic is how
well the business serves the artform.
See ya
Steve
--
Rare 78 rpm recordings on CD! http://www.vintageip.com/records/
Building a museum and archive of animation! http://www.animationarchive.org/
The Quest for the BEST HOTDOG in Los Angeles! http://www.hotdogspot.com/
Rediscovering great stuff from the past! http://www.vintagetips.com/
tomdeacon
david...@aol.com wrote:
> tomdeacon wrote:
>
>
> > As I am fond of repeating - although my voice is almost hoarse in the
> > process - the record business is a business.
>
> No need to make yourself hoarse. Everybody here is well aware that the
> record business is a business, and our feckless protests and
> lamentations are directed as much at the culture generally as at that
> specific (and often deserving) target, the record companies.
Well, that's much better, David.
And before that culture will hear you, you will probably go more than
hoarse.
> Your loyalty to the majors is touching, Tom.
I have no loyalty to anybody, David. Not even to the "majors". I do,
however, have a nagging fondness for the companies that enriched my
childhood with people like Rubinstein, Heifetz, Serkin, Schnabel......
I won't go on. You can fill in the blanks.
I am less grateful to, say, Vox Boxes, for their attempts at enriching
my childhood with Evelyn Crochet, say. But I do take my hat off for
early Brendel, Novaes, Horenstein, Klemperer,.....
> I can only hope that Philips repays you in kind by paying for a coffin adorned with the
> Philips logo when the sad day comes for you.
Philips is dead. A stake was driven into the heart of that company, its
personnel summarily dumped onto the Dutch job market, and its tapes
shipped to Hannover. There is now not a single person who worked for
Philips Classics working for the current entity which claims sway over
the defunct label. And the logo itself is condemned to the dustbin of
history in a few years.
My coffin - and here you are beginning to mirror Tepper, who
consistently and tastelessly wishes for my demise - will never be
graced by that logo.
TD
tomdeacon
Why not? The logic of the marketplace is implacable, Ian. And it has
little to do with art. Of course.
TD
Stephen Worth
Mena <st...@stevedemena.com> wrote:
> Is he really being the "staunchest defender of the virtues of market
> economics" or just applying the same rules of economics that all of us would
> apply to any other business?
The record business is a system for distributing music to the
masses. They're like the paperboy delivering the paper... they
don't make the music, they just deliver it. Imagine if your
paperboy decided that since most people just read the front
page, he's going to throw out the rest of the paper and just
deliver front pages to everyone. By delivering just front pages,
he can fit more papers in his bags and serve a larger route
of addresses. Since he is serving more subscribers now, he'll
be able to cut the subscription price a little and give a break
to his customers. Wouldn't you say that's sound economics?
tomdeacon
david...@aol.com wrote:
> Steven de Mena wrote:
>
> > Is [Tom Deacon] really being the "staunchest defender of the virtues of market
> > economics" or just applying the same rules of economics that all of us would
> > apply to any other business?
>
> Tom is very defensive when it comes to the majors.
It is hardly "defensive" to point out the obvious.
> He isn't simply the dispassionate voice of reason pointing out that the classical music biz
> is a business. He's proud of the majors' successes, and he excuses their failures by pointing out that the biz is a business.
But they haven't failed. At least not in deciding not to retain poor
selling repertoire in their catalogue.
A book publisher which prints a book nobody buys has made a bad
decision. He will try not to repeat that bad decision and learn from
his mistake.
I am hardly "proud" of the majors' successes any more than I am willing
to excuse their failures, of which there have been millions!!!
> At one point there were negotiations between the CSO and DG for a
> recording of Elliott Carter's Cello Concerto with Yo-Yo Ma, Daniel
> Barenboim, and the CSO, who had just given its premiere. In the end,
> negotiations broke down, and DG wouldn't record it. Bridge Records, on
> the other hand, somehow managed the feat of recording it with Fred
> Sherry, Oliver Knussen, and the BBC SO. So there are businesses and
> there are businesses.
And Fred Sherry is not Yo Yo Ma and Oliver Knussen is not Daniel
Barenboim, and the BBC SO is not the CSO.
Why, I wonder, David, do you have such a terrible time with things that
are painfully obvious to most observers.
Do you want me to "guess" why negociations broke down over this piece?
> I should add that Bridge never deletes anything.
Well, there are a few CDs I have recently acquired which hardly merit
release in the first place, so I would have to question this company's
artistic, not to say business, acumen.
TD
tomdeacon
And don't you think, Steve, that both those statements were so
painfully obvious that someone as bright as David should have got the
picture?
TD
tomdeacon
Michael Haslam wrote:
> Steven de Mena <st...@stevedemena.com> wrote:
> >
> > Don't you think the BBC Symphony was a LOT less expensive to record than the
> > Chicago Symphony? And wasn't that CD a co-production with the BBC?
>
> Why would it be MUCH cheaper to record the BBCSO than the CSO, speaking
> purely commercially?
The BBC foots a large portion of the rehearsal and musicians' costs.
The CSO is a "business". The BBC is not, although when you see the
phenomenal sales of Delia Smith cookbooks, you begin to wonder, I will
admit.
TD
Sol L. Siegel
<crcu...@christopherculver.com> wrote:
>I've never seen a "20/21" release as a cutout. In fact, I've never
>seen any DG release as a cutout at the Tower stores in Chicago.
>
>And what the deletion from the catalogue means is that when all copies
>are sold, there won't be *any more left*.
Actually, in my recent experience, deleted items are removed from the
shelves immediately. If was deleted the day before you were going to
the store, too bleeping bad.
How it is decided how the unsold copies are to be disposed of is a
mystery to me.
- Sol L. Siegel, Philadelphia, PA
"My reputation has nothing to do with me." - Terry Gilliam
--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com
Steven de Mena
"Michael Haslam" <innat...@macflat.com> wrote in message
news:1hiy8ya.1jixofpe9ypkfN%innat...@macflat.com...
Haven't you noticed there have been virtually no commercial recordings by
the CSO, BSO, NY Phil, LA Phil and Philadelphia Orchestra for years no?
Musician's union.
Steve
david...@aol.com
Peter T. Daniels wrote:
> Aha! The New York Times puts an asterisk by items in the best-seller
> lists that give evidence of "bulk purchases."
Mine may have amounted to "bulk," but the purchases occurred one at a
time. "Hmmmm. Going to visit my friend, Tom, who always makes me
listen to Trevor Pinnock. Guess I'll take him a copy of
...explosante/fixe..." No, not in retribution.
-david gable
david...@aol.com
Steven de Mena wrote:
> Don't you think the BBC Symphony was a LOT less expensive to record than the
> Chicago Symphony?
Probably.
>And wasn't that CD [Carter Cello Concerto on Bridge] a co-production with the BBC?
Nope. Nor was the BBC SO the only ensemble featured on the release.
-david gable
david...@aol.com
Michael Haslam wrote:
> Why would it be MUCH cheaper to record the BBCSO than the CSO, speaking
> purely commercially?
I don't know about "MUCH," but it would be cheaper because of the
American musicians' union.
-david gable
Steven de Mena
> david...@aol.com wrote:
>> I also know that DG was surprised by how well ...explosante/fixe... sold,
>> and now, after a decade in print at full price, DG has re-issued it at
>> mid-price.
Where is it at mid-price? Both of these issues show $16.98 list prices:
Steve
Steven de Mena
<david...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:1153696344.6...@h48g2000cwc.googlegroups.com...
From their web site:
http://www.bridgerecords.com/pages/catalog/9184.htm
"This highly anticipated recording, a Bridge co-production with the BBC,
...."
Usually when I ask a question like that I already know the answer.
> Nor was the BBC SO the only ensemble featured on the release.
The other ensembles on the CD (London Sinfonietta and the ASKO Ensemble of
Amsterdam) are smaller and less well-known and thus should be even less
expensive.
Steve
david...@aol.com
tomdeacon wrote:
> Who spoke for DG?
You implicitly.
> > ..explosante/fixe... may not sell as well in any given week as all the
> > available recordings of Beethoven's 9th, but in competition with any
> > one of them it does well enough to stay in the catalogue.
>
> Barely. And that is the point.
The point is, it continues to sell enough copies that DG doesn't delete
it from the catalogue.
Most of the items in Sony's so-called Boulez edition have stayed in
print. Other items have been deleted. Boulez's very fine record of
Wagner overtures and the Siegfried Idyll has long since disappeared
while his Berio and Schoenberg remain in print, and not because Wagner
sells less well than Schoenberg or Berio. The Wagner disc has lots
more competition, while Boulez is the superstar with the most name
recognition in the Schoenberg and Berio markets, where there are also
less competing versions. Even Sony has managed to make money selling
recordings of Schoenberg with Boulez conducting.
> I doubt very much that Boulez' music would sell to Pat Robertson and
> his fellow Moral Majority members if Jesus Christ Himself was
> conducting the Heavenly Philharmonic!!!
Jesus does not conduct an orchestra; he sings in a country band by
night, plays Christian rock by day. Pat Robertson is as unlikely to
buy a recording of the Saint Matthew Passion as to buy a recording of
...explosante/fixe...
-david gable
Steven de Mena
<david...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:1153697088....@h48g2000cwc.googlegroups.com...
>
> tomdeacon wrote:
>
>> Who spoke for DG?
>
> You implicitly.
>
>> > ..explosante/fixe... may not sell as well in any given week as all the
>> > available recordings of Beethoven's 9th, but in competition with any
>> > one of them it does well enough to stay in the catalogue.
>>
>> Barely. And that is the point.
>
> The point is, it continues to sell enough copies that DG doesn't delete
> it from the catalogue.
Do you have any sales figures to back that up?
Or could DG be keeping them in print to keep one of their few star
conductors happy?
Steve
david...@aol.com
tomdeacon wrote:
> I have no loyalty to anybody, David. Not even to the "majors". I do,
> however, have a nagging fondness for the companies that enriched my
> childhood with people like Rubinstein, Heifetz, Serkin, Schnabel......
>
> I won't go on. You can fill in the blanks.
>
> I am less grateful to, say, Vox Boxes, for their attempts at enriching
> my childhood with Evelyn Crochet, say. But I do take my hat off for
> early Brendel, Novaes, Horenstein, Klemperer,.....
This is sheer snobbery, Tom. The label doesn't guarantee the quality
of the performance, and there have been plenty of great performances
captured on all kinds of labels. There have been treasures on
Nonesuch, Vox, Everest, Vanguard, etc. etc. etc. There are treasures
on Bridge today. As for Vox, chamber music doesn't get much better
than The Fine Arts Quartet playing Haydn.
-david gable
david...@aol.com
tomdeacon wrote:
> And Fred Sherry is not Yo Yo Ma and Oliver Knussen is not Daniel
> Barenboim, and the BBC SO is not the CSO.
Fred Sherry's reputation as a cellist shines far brighter than Yo-Yo
Ma's among very many musicians and for very good reasons. What do you
know about him? He didn't go the superstar soloist route or seek a DG
contract; he did something far more rewarding with his life, and he
measures success by criteria rather different from yours. That's
something you're incapable of understanding. Knussen mostly doesn't
play standard repertory, which proves Barenboim's superiority to you,
but you're not competent to judge the relative merits of these two
conductors as champions of Carter. As for the BBC SO, they have far
less trouble with Carter than the CSO and far more experience playing
his music. You know nothing about this repertory, your opinions are
ill informed, and your criteria have very little to do with artistry or
musicianship. You look for the certification of a designer label.
Personally I'd have liked a recording with Sherry, Barenboim, and the
BBC SO, but that's neither here nor there. I'm deeply grateful for the
Bridge recording.
-david gable
david...@aol.com
Steven de Mena wrote:
> Do you have any sales figures to back that up?
>
> Or could DG be keeping them in print to keep one of their few star
> conductors happy?
There is no such clause in Boulez's DG contract.
-david gable
Vaneyes
tomdeacon wrote:
>
> Philips is dead. A stake was driven into the heart of that company....
Yes, and that's one of the industry's biggest shames...as is the lack
of American orchestra recording contracts.
In the early to mid '80's, IMO, Philips consistently manufactured the
best-sounding CDs. They seemed to not miss a beat going from LP to CD,
while many other labels struggled. Some are still struggling. The
Philips artist line-up was second to none.
They're gone, but thankfully, still listened to.
Regards
david...@aol.com
Steven de Mena wrote:
> Do you have any sales figures to back that up?
>
> Or could DG be keeping them in print to keep one of their few star
> conductors happy?
I should have added that the attitude characteristic of most record
collectors differs considerably from the attitude of most performing
musicians.
If you think every performer who makes commercial recordings keeps
close tabs on his or her recordings, you're out of your mind. (There
are, of course, record collecting types among professional musicians,
but that doesn't mean that they spend every waking hour policing the
state of the recordings in which they've participated.) The very last
thing Boulez is aware of is the fate of his recordings once he walks
out of the recording studio.
Nor is Boulez's career typical of the average superstar conductor's.
For Abbado, Dohnanyi, et al, their conducting career is essentially
their whole life. Boulez has cut back now that he's 80, but for many
years, in addition to pursuing careers as a composer and a conductor,
Boulez was in in all sorts of administrative positions and active in
politicking for various projects in France. Founding IRCAM and the
Ensemble InterContemporain were only the tip of the iceberg. The
stunning new music school opened in Paris several years ago, the Cité
de la Musique, was Boulez's baby.
(I remember an interview with Mirella Freni in which an irritated Freni
informed an interviewer naive enough to be shocked that she never
listened to records, and that she gave all of the complementary copies
of her own records that she received to her niece.)
-david gable
Vaneyes
Christopher Culver wrote:
> "Peter T. Daniels" <gram...@verizon.net> writes:
> > Then go to Tower (or Berkshire Music?) and pick them up as cutouts.
>
> I've never seen a "20/21" release as a cutout. In fact, I've never
> seen any DG release as a cutout at the Tower stores in Chicago.
>
> And what the deletion from the catalogue means is that when all copies
> what does someone who develops an interest in, say, Lieberson's music
> five years from now do? He'll pay two or three times the former price
> for a rare used copy.
I haven't seen 20/21s as cutouts, either. In fact, I didn't always see
them in brick 'n mortars at full-price. Seemingly, erratic
distribution. But as we all know by now, m/o can quickly solve local
shortcomings.
20/21 never struck me as being long-term. Now, some are probably
destined for Amazon Marketplace high-end--$200 to $400. heh heh
Regards
Steven de Mena
<david...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:1153699517.4...@i3g2000cwc.googlegroups.com...
Steven de Mena wrote:
====quoting did not seem to work with this reply..Sorry=====
*Listening* to your own records, or "collecting" them, is totally different
than being aware of and/or caring if your recordings are in print and how
they are marketed. I would think musicians have egos too.
Unless you have personal knowledge that Boulez and/or his management do not
care if the recordings of his compositions go out of print, then you are
just theorizing.
Steve
Steven de Mena
"Vaneyes" <van...@excite.com> wrote in message
news:1153699962.8...@b28g2000cwb.googlegroups.com...
> I haven't seen 20/21s as cutouts, either. In fact, I didn't always see
> them in brick 'n mortars at full-price. Seemingly, erratic
> distribution. But as we all know by now, m/o can quickly solve local
> shortcomings.
>
> 20/21 never struck me as being long-term. Now, some are probably
> destined for Amazon Marketplace high-end--$200 to $400. heh heh
>
> Regards
>
I guess it would have been 20/21/22 if it were really destined to be
long-term. :)
Steve
david...@aol.com
>
> *Listening* to your own records, or "collecting" them, is totally different
> than being aware of and/or caring if your recordings are in print and how
> they are marketed. I would think musicians have egos too.
They do, including Boulez.
> Unless you have personal knowledge that Boulez and/or his management do not
> care if the recordings of his compositions go out of print, then you are
> just theorizing.
I am not just theorizing. And it's not a question of caring or not
caring.
-david gable
Ian Pace
<david...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:1153698430....@m79g2000cwm.googlegroups.com...
emotionally-retarded timekeeper like Knussen is most definitely not
Barenboim (and that's coming from one who is not a particularly big
Barenboim fan), and in no sense are the world's No. 1 group of
sight-readers, the BBC SO, to be compared with the CSO. They can put the
dots in the right place in Carter and others perhaps as quickly as anyone
else, but are not interested in going much further. Occasionally a really
good conductor can get good things out of them, but that's very much the
exception rather than the rule. Little in the way of orchestral personality,
distinctive sound, idiomatic feel for any corner of the repertoire (they
play everything very 'professionally') or any of the other things that go to
make up a good orchestra.
Ian
Christopher Culver
> expect more people to want them five years hence than want them now?
> And if there should be a sudden demand spurt, then DG, or whoever owns
> Universal by then, will reissue them cheaper.
An example: A couple of years I became interested in the music of
Sofia Gubaidulina through DG's "Offertorium" reissue, so I started
collecting everything by her. A Col legno CD with the only recording
of a piece of her, issued in the mid-1990s, had gone out of print, and
I had to pay more for a rare used copy. I'm facing the same problem
with Per Norgard, whose operas are hard to find even though his
symphonies are now nicely marketed by Chandos. So, demand (at least
small demand) in a composer can go up, whether by the work of another
company or say, a birthday celebration, without a record company
deciding to reissue past works. In fact, one has to wait for whatever
record company is now showing attention in the composer to make a
whole new recording of the piece one desires, and this is a slow and
often wasteful enterprise.
Christopher Culver
> I don't know Sherry's playing so can't comment on that, but an
> emotionally-retarded timekeeper like Knussen is most definitely not
> Barenboim
Most of Knussen's conducting is of repertoire where "emotions" just
aren't the composer's concern. Why should he do anything other than
play what the score indicates in Carter, Norgard (I'm thinking of
"Voyage", which Knussen once conducted) Lindberg, or Takemitsu? Are
you a fan of conductors who distort the score for their own agenda?
Ian Pace
"Christopher Culver" <crcu...@christopherculver.com> wrote in message
news:87fygr3...@aura.christopherculver.com...
> "Ian Pace" <i...@ianpace.com> writes:
>> I don't know Sherry's playing so can't comment on that, but an
>> emotionally-retarded timekeeper like Knussen is most definitely not
>> Barenboim
>
> Most of Knussen's conducting is of repertoire where "emotions" just
> aren't the composer's concern. Why should he do anything other than
> play what the score indicates in Carter, Norgard (I'm thinking of
> "Voyage", which Knussen once conducted) Lindberg, or Takemitsu? Are
> you a fan of conductors who distort the score for their own agenda?
>
Carter or Takemitsu in particular, or the earlier Lindberg (I'm not keen on
the late Lindberg, not particularly on Norgaard). This geisha-girl style of
playing Takemitsu, of which Knussen is one of the primary exponents, has
played a big part in implying that his music is purely decorative and
ephemeral. There is a much greater depth to it on many levels, passion and
even savagery at times.
Attuning oneself to possible emotional content in a score is by no means
'distorting the score'; on the contrary, in many cases it is the slick and
thoroughly detached performances that do that (which is not to say that a
'heart on sleeve' approach is necessarily the best way to project and
realise the emotional content of a score).
Ian
david...@aol.com
Ian Pace wrote:
> I don't know Sherry's playing so can't comment on that, but an
> emotionally-retarded timekeeper like Knussen is most definitely not
> Barenboim (and that's coming from one who is not a particularly big
> Barenboim fan), and in no sense are the world's No. 1 group of
> sight-readers, the BBC SO, to be compared with the CSO. They can put the
> dots in the right place in Carter and others perhaps as quickly as anyone
> else, but are not interested in going much further.
I know of your personal animus toward Knussen and your passionate bias
against the English: you loathe the English as only an Englishman can.
If your remarks are true of the BBC SO, they apply to any major
orchestra in the world. The BBC SO is far superior to the CSO in its
assimilation of Carter's music, far more at ease with it. Just compare
the CSO and BBC SO recordings of Partita (although that's not the only
basis for my claim). You Londoners with multiple orchestras far more
experienced at playing contemporary music than any US orchesta are
spoiled and don't even know it. Boulez has at his disposal all of the
greatest orchestras in the world. When he records a big orchestral
piece of his own, he uses the BBC SO. There's a reason why.
As for Knussen, there's no question that he's far more than merely
competent to conduct Carter's music, and Elliott Carter has been more
than satisfied with performances by both Barenboim and Carter. I
prefer Barenboim's Carter, myself. Indeed, the only other living
conductor I've heard who can approach him in Carter's music is Michael
Gielen. But that's in part a generational thing. Knussen, Robertson,
and all the rest find Carter's rhythms as easy as a stroll down the
street and are capable of an almost terrifying mechanical perfection,
but they belong to a younger generation that isn't interested in
digging in and phrasing the way Barenboim and Gielen still do. They
might as well be conducting Steve Reich. Barenboim's and Gielen's
performances more strongly resemble the performances of the Carterians
of the old days . . . Frederick Prausnitz, Hans Rosbaud, Leonard
Bernstein, Gustav Meier, the first couple of lineups of the Juilliard
String Quartet, etc. Have you actually heard Barenboim perform Carter
or Boulez live? It's a very different experience from hearing the 80%
of his performances that are excessively relaxed and laid back.
-david gable
Matthew B. Tepper
following letters to be typed in
news:NYqdnf40oafIY17Z...@comcast.com:
> "Michael Haslam" <innat...@macflat.com> wrote in message
> news:1hiy8ya.1jixofpe9ypkfN%innat...@macflat.com...
>> Steven de Mena <st...@stevedemena.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> Don't you think the BBC Symphony was a LOT less expensive to record
>>> than the Chicago Symphony? And wasn't that CD a co-production with
>>> the BBC?
>>
>> Why would it be MUCH cheaper to record the BBCSO than the CSO, speaking
>> purely commercially?
>
> Haven't you noticed there have been virtually no commercial recordings
> by the CSO, BSO, NY Phil, LA Phil and Philadelphia Orchestra for years
> no? Musician's union.
I thought I had seen recently on the DGG Website that Esa-Pekka Salonen
will be making recordings (and I don't just mean the iTunes in-concert
jobs) with the Los Angeles Philharmonic at Walt Disney Concert Hall....
--
Matthew B. Tepper: WWW, science fiction, classical music, ducks!
My personal home page -- http://home.earthlink.net/~oy/index.html
My main music page --- http://home.earthlink.net/~oy/berlioz.html
To write to me, do for my address what Androcles did for the lion
I ask you to judge me by the enemies I have made. ~ FDR (attrib.)
Matthew B. Tepper
> "Matthew B. Tepper" <oy兀earthlink.net> wrote in message
> news:Xns9809847C26C...@207.217.125.201...
>
>> Besides, some online sites have search engines which are usable. And
>> then there's Arkivmusic, which features a drilldown menu of astonishing
>> power.
>
> Read as "they don't have a search engine".
In what way, pray tell, is it not as good as a search enging? I can use
Arkivmusic's drilldown to find all available recordings by Ginette Neveu;
all available recordings of Shostakovich's 6th Symphony; all recordings of
Bernstein conducting Mahler on Sony; and so on. And it will show me all
these things in mere seconds, as the "slog factor" is markedly reduced,
compared with (for example) an Amazon.com search.
>> Many of the individual listings contain useful information, such as the
>> recording dates, collaborating artists, and sometimes even timings.
>>
>> What I object to specifically are the iTunes classical search engines,
>> which are still inadequate to the task. Worse are the ones (much more
>> common) which only permit "Artist" and "Title," because the designers
>> don't think there should ever be any reason to want more.
>
> I am impressed with how iTunes uses the "Composer" ID3-tag, which is
> rarely used and not even accessible in many ripping programs (such as
> the much-touted "EAC"). This field helps a lot in Classical searches.
>
>> If we are truly at a crossroads, then let us have those search engines
>> which will be adequate to the cause, not the crappy ones we usually see.
>
> Search engines usually only get better, not worse, so I am not too
> concerned.
It is true that we classical music lovers need iTunes to have better and
more specific search engines. Maybe we should just try asking for them.
Look at how responsive Apple has been to another request important to us,
for gapless playing. Look at how quickly they met THAT demand!
Matthew B. Tepper
following letters to be typed in news:1153698430.921316.69840
@m79g2000cwm.googlegroups.com:
> Fred Sherry's reputation as a cellist shines far brighter than Yo-Yo Ma's
> among very many musicians and for very good reasons.
For one thing, Sherry still makes recordings of classical music.
Matthew B. Tepper
letters to be typed in news:CsmdnTUBxusNj1nZ...@comcast.com:
> I guess it would have been 20/21/22 if it were really destined to be
> long-term. :)
That would be assuming that the people "in charge" cared about forward
planning. I don't see much evidence that they care about next year, let
alone even ten years hence, let alone 95!
david...@aol.com
Christopher Culver wrote:
> Most of Knussen's conducting is of repertoire where "emotions" just
> aren't the composer's concern. Why should he do anything other than
> play what the score indicates in Carter, Norgard (I'm thinking of
> "Voyage", which Knussen once conducted) Lindberg, or Takemitsu? Are
> you a fan of conductors who distort the score for their own agenda?
I'm interested in performers who do more than mechanically reproduce
the notes in the score regardless of how brilliantly they're able to do
so. Your post perfectly reflects a point of view now common among
classical performers. It's a new point of view.
As for Carter, his music does nothing but express and is very deeply
rooted in expressive gestures of a kind going back to Beethoven,
Mahler, and Berg. I can't stand the way Knussen and David Robertson
conduct his music. Most of the performers he's worked with all of his
life and written for all his life do NOT perform his music the way they
do. Have you ever heard the recording of the 2nd Quartet that the
Juilliard Quartet made right after the first performance circa 1960?
-david gable
Steven de Mena
"Matthew B. Tepper" <oyþ@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:Xns9809CF9C8D6...@207.217.125.201...
> "Steven de Mena" <st...@stevedemena.com> appears to have caused the
> following letters to be typed in
> news:NYqdnf40oafIY17Z...@comcast.com:
>
>> "Michael Haslam" <innat...@macflat.com> wrote in message
>> news:1hiy8ya.1jixofpe9ypkfN%innat...@macflat.com...
>>> Steven de Mena <st...@stevedemena.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> Don't you think the BBC Symphony was a LOT less expensive to record
>>>> than the Chicago Symphony? And wasn't that CD a co-production with
>>>> the BBC?
>>>
>>> Why would it be MUCH cheaper to record the BBCSO than the CSO, speaking
>>> purely commercially?
>>
>> Haven't you noticed there have been virtually no commercial recordings
>> by the CSO, BSO, NY Phil, LA Phil and Philadelphia Orchestra for years
>> no? Musician's union.
>
> I thought I had seen recently on the DGG Website that Esa-Pekka Salonen
> will be making recordings (and I don't just mean the iTunes in-concert
> jobs) with the Los Angeles Philharmonic at Walt Disney Concert Hall....
There is supposed to be one forthcoming release on CD (and I think SACD
too), though it is an "in-concert" job like the iTunes ones.
September 2006
1 SACD 477 619-8
Esa-Pekka Salonen
SACD Hybrid
MUSSORGSKY: Night on Bald Mountain (original version)
BARTÓK: Suite from The Miraculous Mandarin
STRAVINSKY: The Rite of Spring (version 1947)
Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra / Esa-Pekka Salonen
Recording Information:
Recording: Los Angeles (Walt Disney Concert Hall), 01/2006 (live recording)
Producer: Valérie Gross
Project Coordinator: Matthias Spindler
Recording Producer: Sid McLauchlan
Tonmeister (Balance Engineer): Rainer Maillard
Recording Engineer: Fred Vogler
Steve
Steven de Mena
"Matthew B. Tepper" <oyş@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:Xns9809CF9C245...@207.217.125.201...
> "Steven de Mena" <st...@stevedemena.com> appears to have caused the
> following letters to be typed in
> news:lNCdndQHjZSxR17Z...@comcast.com:
>
>> news:Xns9809847C26C...@207.217.125.201...
>>
>>> Besides, some online sites have search engines which are usable. And
>>> then there's Arkivmusic, which features a drilldown menu of astonishing
>>> power.
>>
>> Read as "they don't have a search engine".
>
> In what way, pray tell, is it not as good as a search enging?
The other day someone posted the link to their 519 "ArkivCDs" and you
wondered if the Beethoven Mandolin LP was amongst them. I could see no way
to determine this without browsing through all 519 releases.
Steve
Ian Pace
<david...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:1153711213.6...@b28g2000cwb.googlegroups.com...
>
> Ian Pace wrote:
>
>> I don't know Sherry's playing so can't comment on that, but an
>> emotionally-retarded timekeeper like Knussen is most definitely not
>> Barenboim (and that's coming from one who is not a particularly big
>> Barenboim fan), and in no sense are the world's No. 1 group of
>> sight-readers, the BBC SO, to be compared with the CSO. They can put the
>> dots in the right place in Carter and others perhaps as quickly as anyone
>> else, but are not interested in going much further.
>
> I know of your personal animus toward Knussen and your passionate bias
> against the English: you loathe the English as only an Englishman can.
Actually, I don't loathe all things about the English (have a lot of time
for BBC News, for example). And I do play a large amount of contemporary
English music (on the more radical side of things, though - I'm not
particularly interested in the tinsel music of Knussen and his ilk).
> If your remarks are true of the BBC SO, they apply to any major
> orchestra in the world.
No, the BBC SO is especially like that. It's by no means the best of the
London orchestras (compare the LSO or the Philharmonia, both fine groups of
players).
> The BBC SO is far superior to the CSO in its
> assimilation of Carter's music, far more at ease with it. Just compare
> the CSO and BBC SO recordings of Partita (although that's not the only
> basis for my claim). You Londoners with multiple orchestras far more
> experienced at playing contemporary music than any US orchesta are
> spoiled and don't even know it.
Actually, there are too many orchestras in London, and the funding and
audiences are spread too thinly. The BBC SO certainly do the most
contemporary music, but that's because the BBC itself is one of the biggest
backers of it.
> Boulez has at his disposal all of the
> greatest orchestras in the world. When he records a big orchestral
> piece of his own, he uses the BBC SO. There's a reason why.
There could be a lot of reasons for that, including costs. A serviceable
result can be got more quickly with the BBC SO than perhaps any other
orchestra in the world. The thing is, they rarely want to go beyond that.
I'm certainly not unusual in feeling that way about them. An awful lot of
players join the BBC SO as a stepping-stone to other jobs, so there is a
high turn-over. It does show.
>
> As for Knussen, there's no question that he's far more than merely
> competent to conduct Carter's music, and Elliott Carter has been more
> than satisfied with performances by both Barenboim and Carter. I
> prefer Barenboim's Carter, myself. Indeed, the only other living
> conductor I've heard who can approach him in Carter's music is Michael
> Gielen. But that's in part a generational thing. Knussen, Robertson,
> and all the rest find Carter's rhythms as easy as a stroll down the
> street and are capable of an almost terrifying mechanical perfection,
> but they belong to a younger generation that isn't interested in
> digging in and phrasing the way Barenboim and Gielen still do. They
> might as well be conducting Steve Reich.
Indeed.
Ian
Matthew B. Tepper
Oh, I searched another way: Composers - Beethoven - Chamber Music - search
for iterations of the word "mandolin" and examine the results. No Vox or
Turnabout for any of them. Ergo, it isn't among the ArkivCDs.
You're quite good at searching; I imagine you'd have come up with this same
method given a bit of reflection.
Steven de Mena
Find the Beethoven Violin Concerto, in the piano arrangement with Daniel
Barenboim. When you drill down to the Violin Concerto list of performers,
Barenboim is not there. [Clicking on "Zukerman" will pull it up, though]
Steve
Christopher Culver
> I'm interested in performers who do more than mechanically reproduce
> the notes in the score regardless of how brilliantly they're able to do
> so.
If a performer goes beyond the score, how does he know the composer's
intentions? Just think about how many different recordings there are
of, say, Shostakovich's fifth symphony, with some performing it as if
it were slyly anti-Communist, others as if it were overtly
anti-Communist, others as if it were sincere, and everyone with
varying degrees of love or hate. I don't see any of that in the
score. It seems to be that performers inject their own thoughts into
the piece, creating a performance which is arbitrary and is not
guaranteed to reflect the intentions of the composer and accurately
follow his system.
Think of a piece like Lindberg's "Engine", based on the output of a
computer programme developed at IRCAM. If a conductor took liberties
with the piece in the name of emotion, there's the risk that we
wouldn't be hearing the strict formal scheme that Lindberg
employed. And that's where a faithful marker of time like Knussen
comes in.
> As for Carter, his music does nothing but express and is very deeply
> rooted in expressive gestures of a kind going back to Beethoven,
> Mahler, and Berg. I can't stand the way Knussen and David Robertson
> conduct his music. Most of the performers he's worked with all of
> his life and written for all his life do NOT perform his music the
> way they do.
If these performers have worked with the composer, then they know what
he wants. But why doesn't Carter put such indications into the scores,
so that performing his music correctly isn't dependent on knowing him
personally? Sure would make things easier for future generations.
david...@aol.com
Christopher Culver wrote:
> If a performer goes beyond the score, how does he know the composer's
> intentions?
Traditionally, music has arisen within performing traditions.
Performers have ways of doing things to which they don't give a
thought, just as, when you speak English, you don't speak an
unremitting monotone but inflect your speech. Most of this sort of
thing is transmitted and absorbed simply by living in an environment
where you hear other performers, just as you learned how to inflect
English by hearing it spoken as a child.
I'm not claiming that the way you inflect English has been handed down
from century to century unaltered. I am only claiming that we grow up
inflecting speech, and not to do so would feel unnatural. That's the
way I feel about way too many merely mechanical accurate performances
of classical music from the last quarter century or so. I also admit
the possibility of music that demands that kind of performances, much
of Steve Reich's for example. But Elliott Carter is as far from that
kind of conception as it is possible to be.
-david gable
Matthew B. Tepper
You have to look for the work as "Concerto for Piano in D major, Op. 61a."
Searching on it via Barenboim-as-instrumentalist works too. I never said
that Arkivmusic's drilldown was perfect; but for the uses to which I would
put it, it is far superior to many other search sites.
Gerard
> >
> >
> As are practically all of his posts. He joined the group recently and
> has done little but complain ever since.
> Allen
We can't be all a never complaining PPLY, Allen.
What's your complaint this time?
Michael Haslam
> Michael Haslam wrote:
> > Steven de Mena <st...@stevedemena.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > Don't you think the BBC Symphony was a LOT less expensive to record
> > > than the Chicago Symphony? And wasn't that CD a co-production with
> > > the BBC?
> >
> > Why would it be MUCH cheaper to record the BBCSO than the CSO, speaking
> > purely commercially?
>
> The BBC foots a large portion of the rehearsal and musicians' costs.
For a *commercial* recording? Can you give an example?
I suspect it would be illegal under the BBC charter for it to subsidise
a commercial recording; under the internal market introduced by John
Birt even the BBC library services and pronunciation unit had to charge
a "market price" to internal BBC clients.
--
MJHaslam
Remove accidentals to obtain correct e-address
"Can't you show a little restraint?" - Dr. David Tholen
Kirk McElhearn
> It is true that we classical music lovers need iTunes to have better
> and more specific search engines. Maybe we should just try asking for
> them. Look at how responsive Apple has been to another request
> important to us, for gapless playing. Look at how quickly they met
> THAT demand!
Use the Advanced Search, where you can search for composer (but not label yet).
Kirk
--
Read my blog, Kirkville
http://www.mcelhearn.com
Michael Haslam
> <david...@aol.com> wrote in message
> news:1153696344.6...@h48g2000cwc.googlegroups.com...
>
> > Nor was the BBC SO the only ensemble featured on the release.
>
> The other ensembles on the CD (London Sinfonietta and the ASKO Ensemble of
> Amsterdam) are smaller and less well-known and thus should be even less
> expensive.
I'd have thought the London Sinfonietta would be, per player, *more*
expensive than the BBCSO.
Kirk McElhearn
> Haven't you noticed there have been virtually no commercial recordings
> by the CSO, BSO, NY Phil, LA Phil and Philadelphia Orchestra for years
> no? Musician's union.
That's what has been slowing up digital releases of live archives, in
fact. I've talked with several people involved in digital classical
music projects who are tearing their hair out because of the complexity
of such agreements.
Steven de Mena
> tomdeacon <tomde...@yahoo.ca> wrote:
>
>> Michael Haslam wrote:
>> > Steven de Mena <st...@stevedemena.com> wrote:
>> > >
>> > > Don't you think the BBC Symphony was a LOT less expensive to record
>> > > than the Chicago Symphony? And wasn't that CD a co-production with
>> > > the BBC?
>> >
>> > Why would it be MUCH cheaper to record the BBCSO than the CSO, speaking
>> > purely commercially?
>>
>> The BBC foots a large portion of the rehearsal and musicians' costs.
>
> For a *commercial* recording? Can you give an example?
>
> I suspect it would be illegal under the BBC charter for it to subsidise
> a commercial recording; under the internal market introduced by John
> Birt even the BBC library services and pronunciation unit had to charge
> a "market price" to internal BBC clients.
Well, the Bridge web site says this CD is a co-production with the BBC.
Steve
Gabriel Parra
> The problem is that the classical-music "division" too-often isn't run as a
> business. The classical moguls seem to assume that customers will rush to
> purchase overpriced products that haven't been properly promoted.
Do you really believe it is a promotion issue, as regards modernist
music? Or maybe it's a creation issue? I don't know...
Gabriel Parra
> True, but will they play on a burned CD? (I assume you can expand them to
> WAV files.)
I believe all CD burner software will convert Mp3s to CD format (wave).
It is not very difficult to find those that will do the same for Flac.
Gabriel Parra
> No need to make yourself hoarse. Everybody here is well aware that the
> record business is a business, and our feckless protests and
> lamentations are directed as much at the culture generally as at that
> specific (and often deserving) target, the record companies.
"Protests and lamentations" directed "at the culture"? What does that
mean? Could one similarly protest and lament the sorry state of
creativity or lack thereof among modernist composers? Or is it that
listeners are plainly wrong to eschew music they simply do not like?
Gabriel Parra
> I never understand why, when it comes to the record business, Tom becomes
> the staunchest defender of the virtues of market economics.
Perhaps because it is preferable to totalitarianism and socialism. Not
that you would know.
Gabriel Parra
> Why not? The logic of the marketplace is implacable, Ian. And it has
> little to do with art. Of course.
No use explaining capitalist logic to a socialist, Tom. Don't talk to
him about art, either, about which he cares little. Philology and
historicist conjecture, that's his trade.
Gabriel Parra
> The record business is a system for distributing music to the
> masses. They're like the paperboy delivering the paper... they
> don't make the music, they just deliver it. Imagine if your
> paperboy decided that since most people just read the front
> page, he's going to throw out the rest of the paper and just
> deliver front pages to everyone. By delivering just front pages,
> he can fit more papers in his bags and serve a larger route
> of addresses. Since he is serving more subscribers now, he'll
> be able to cut the subscription price a little and give a break
> to his customers. Wouldn't you say that's sound economics?
Wow, this must be one of the most poorly drawn analogies I have ever
seen. Your paperboy is actually the shipping company in this case.
Record companies are not just the deliverers, but the producers. As for
reducing a paper to just the headlines, well, we already have that in
the shape of USA Today.
Christopher Culver
> Could one similarly protest and lament the sorry state of
> creativity or lack thereof among modernist composers?
Lack of creativity? Isn't the usual complaint about modernist
composers that they prize innovation too much?
Gabriel Parra
> I'm interested in performers who do more than mechanically reproduce
> the notes in the score regardless of how brilliantly they're able to do
> so. Your post perfectly reflects a point of view now common among
> classical performers. It's a new point of view.
Sadly, this is not so. It is hardly a new point of view. What about
"New Obectivity"?
Gabriel Parra
> If a performer goes beyond the score, how does he know the composer's
> intentions? Just think about how many different recordings there are
> of, say, Shostakovich's fifth symphony, with some performing it as if
> it were slyly anti-Communist, others as if it were overtly
> anti-Communist, others as if it were sincere, and everyone with
> varying degrees of love or hate. I don't see any of that in the
> score. It seems to be that performers inject their own thoughts into
> the piece, creating a performance which is arbitrary and is not
> guaranteed to reflect the intentions of the composer and accurately
> follow his system.
Why, then, don't you just read the damned score and have no one play
it. That way, you will be guaranteed absolute fidelity to the (silence)
of the score.
> Think of a piece like Lindberg's "Engine", based on the output of a
> computer programme developed at IRCAM. If a conductor took liberties
> with the piece in the name of emotion, there's the risk that we
> wouldn't be hearing the strict formal scheme that Lindberg
> employed. And that's where a faithful marker of time like Knussen
> comes in.
Any music that can be performed by a computer or a "faithful marker of
time" and not lose anything in the process is not music worth hearing.
> If these performers have worked with the composer, then they know what
> he wants. But why doesn't Carter put such indications into the scores,
> so that performing his music correctly isn't dependent on knowing him
> personally? Sure would make things easier for future generations.
Performing music "correctly"? Is that even possible, if at all
desirable? And perhaps Carter doesn't dot very i and cross every t
because he knows that his music must be performed to come alive by a
musician who will have a subjective reaction to it and maybe, just
maybe, find elements in the music the composer himself never knew were
there. It is incorrect to think the composer has the last word about
his or her own music.
tomdeacon
david...@aol.com wrote:
> tomdeacon wrote:
>
> > Who spoke for DG?
>
> You implicitly.
*I* was not the one who claimed that DG was surprised by the sales.
DG is never surprised by the sales of 20/21. The sales for that series
usually depress the hell out of everyone in the company.
> > > ..explosante/fixe... may not sell as well in any given week as all the
> > > available recordings of Beethoven's 9th, but in competition with any
> > > one of them it does well enough to stay in the catalogue.
> >
> > Barely. And that is the point.
>
> The point is, it continues to sell enough copies that DG doesn't delete
> it from the catalogue.
The breaking point at Philips was 300 CDs per year.
I wonder how few would satisfy DG?
> Most of the items in Sony's so-called Boulez edition have stayed in
> print. Other items have been deleted. Boulez's very fine record of
> Wagner overtures and the Siegfried Idyll has long since disappeared
> while his Berio and Schoenberg remain in print, and not because Wagner
> sells less well than Schoenberg or Berio. The Wagner disc has lots
> more competition, while Boulez is the superstar with the most name
> recognition in the Schoenberg and Berio markets, where there are also
> less competing versions. Even Sony has managed to make money selling
> recordings of Schoenberg with Boulez conducting.
You know this for a fact, or you're just guessing. I don't have
figures, David, but I suspect you're wrong.
> > I doubt very much that Boulez' music would sell to Pat Robertson and
> > his fellow Moral Majority members if Jesus Christ Himself was
> > conducting the Heavenly Philharmonic!!!
>
> Jesus does not conduct an orchestra; he sings in a country band by
> night, plays Christian rock by day. Pat Robertson is as unlikely to
> buy a recording of the Saint Matthew Passion as to buy a recording of
> ...explosante/fixe...
Ah, but neither has ever had Jesus leading a heavenly band with a
little stick in his hand.
Now, that would sell to anyone, I would think, even the
country-and-western crowd from Missouri.
TD