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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
72 of 76 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A "Must Have" collection for the Rachmaninoff Lover,
By
This review is from: Sergei Rachmaninoff: The Complete Recordings (Audio CD)
I still remember how excited I was when this collection first became available. Finally, I could hear a huge number of Rachmaninoff's pieces performed by the master himself, and discover his true intentions for the pieces.Upon listening to the discs, I was both pleased and disappointed. On one hand, the performances are irreplaceable, because Rachmaninoff's own performances must be considered the fundamental reference point for interpretation of his compositions. Rachmaninoff tended to play fast and without exaggeration, almost "dry." His performances are quite different than what has come to be accepted as "standard." I like his style, but some may find it too brusque. My disappointment comes from the sound quality of the discs. While RCA did its best with the ancient source material, the hiss and pop and general "low-fidelity" of these recordings can be distracting, and can occasionally make it difficult to hear everything that is going on. Peak orchestral volume can create distortion drowning out the piano, for example. For acoustical reasons, it would be difficult to play this music casually - if you played these discs for friends without explanation, they would wonder what's wrong with your stereo. So I listen to these discs primarily for analytical purposes - when I want to compare and contrast Rachmaninoff's performances with others'. Yes I have occasionally listened for simple pleasure, but my ears prefer newer recordings that sound more "real," even if the performance itself is not as good.
64 of 68 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Save some $ money! Get the newer January 2006 reissue set instead.,
By
This review is from: Sergei Rachmaninoff: The Complete Recordings (Audio CD)
At the time of this review, whenever you search for a phrase such as "Rachmaninoff Complete", amazon's search engine always lands on this out-of-print recording (ASIN: B000003FB7) . It's also no fun to see that it costs more than a hundred bucks! But if you type "B000A2AD2S" in the search box, you'll see the new reissued set for half the price. It's the exact same 10 CDs. Just the cover art is different.
Unfortunately, this situation is a common pattern with amazon's listing of classical music: when you use your intuition and type in common-sense search phrases for Bach, Mozart, etc, you often get the ultra-expensive out-of-print ships-in-4-weeks items as the default item. It takes a lot of detective work to find the newer reissue recordings. For example, to find the new reissue without knowing the ASIN, I had to enter just "Rachmaninoff" in the search text (deliberately left the word "Complete" out of the search) so it would no longer lock me into this item page that you're looking at and give me a full listing instead. I then sorted the listing by "Original Release Date" and found it on the 2nd page. There's no picture on the new item which doesn't give you any confidence that you found the right one. Don't worry, B000A2AD2S is what you want. For product research, it's good to have both ASIN product listings because the older out-of-print B000003FB7 has the sound samples (and also all the helpful customer reviews) while the new B000A2AD2S has the better price and availability. To make things even more confusing, the amazon staff sometimes copies entire customer reviews to the new item which would then make THIS review seem strangely out of place. If that happens and I notice it, I will delete this review for B000003FB7. (In another strange twist, amazon searches in rock/pop usually points you to the newer cheaper remastered/repackaged/reissued/whatever of a particular recording. I don't know why it works the opposite way in classical music?!?!)
20 of 20 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
An invaluable Legacy by a pianistic legend of 20th Century,
By A Customer
This review is from: Sergei Rachmaninoff: The Complete Recordings (Audio CD)
Quite simply a must for any serious collector of legendary performers from the past, this collection contains the entire recorded legacy of Sergei Rachmaninoff, considered by many to be one of the greatest if not "the" greatest pianist of our century. Containing outstanding recording notes as well as a full discography, this box set features not only brilliant individual interpretations of selected works of Rachmaninoff played imitiably by the composer but also outstanding performances of Chopin's B-flat minor sonata and Schumann's Carnaval. Although the recorded sound varies greatly from performance to performance, these interpretations will always remain an remarkable document of the Golden Age of Pianism which includes such illustrius names as Paderewski, Rosenthal, Hofmann, etc. At this budget price offered by RCA Gold Seal, it should be acquired by any serious lover of piano before it goes out of print.
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