Kris: Actually, your question isn't such a small one; in fact, I'd say the overwhelming glut of choice is probably one thing that keeps more people from buying classical recordings, especially since not everyone has access to a store that has a courteous, knowledgeable and quick-thinking clerk like Joseph Zitt behind the counter. To cut to the chase, low price is normally NOT an indicator of performance quality anymore, not since a label called Naxos came in and revolutionized (some say "killed") the industry by offering good new digital recordings of both basic repertoire and an increasingly wide patch of unusual repertoire, in performances that ranged from decent to absolutely excellent. It used to be assumed that Naxos recorded everything with second rate Eastern European orchestras and soloists to keep the costs low, but for my money, *almost* everything they've done over the last five to seven years has been completely competitive, and I have no trouble recommending their recordings to newcomers on a budget. Some Naxos recordings can now be considered top contenders... for instance, the Maggini Quartet's series of early 20th century English string quartets, the composer-supervised Lutoslawski cycle and the ongoing cycle of Messiaen's piano music by Hakan Austbo are all especially good. The Naxos recording of Messiaen's Turangalila Symphony, by Antoni Wit and the Polish National Radio Symphony, is better than almost every full-priced alternative available. Your average Naxos release is as good as just about anything out there in unusual repertoire, but in mainstream repertoire, there's usually another attractive option. The major labels have a tendency to recycle recordings by their biggest stars over and over and over again, usually at a lower price and with improved sound quality each time. You can find important recordings by Bernstein, Ormandy, Szell and many others at dirt-cheap prices, and as far as the interpretations go, they're still some of the best. These series include Sony's Essential Classics (usually around $7) and the late, lamented Bernstein Century line (usually $10), Universal's Eloquence series, Warner's Apex series and EMI's Seraphim line. In fact, it's these increasingly good-sounding remasterings of legendary performances at lower prices that have truly undercut the ability of today's performers to issue mainstream repertoire with impunity. Who needs a new, full price recording of Debussy's 'La Mer' by Daniel Barenboim when you can get a completely fabulous performance by Vladimir Ashkenazy with, arguably, a better orchestra - AND in a first-rate digital recording - for less than half the price? There's one more thing I should mention: Naxos has begun to issue truly legendary recordings from the dawn of recording to the '40s on their Naxos Historical label, snatching up major-label recordings that have fallen into public domain by such artists as Toscanini, Heifetz, Caruso, Schnabel - even Richard Strauss, Prokofiev and Rachmaninoff themselves. The remastering technicians have made these recordings sound better than ever, BUT unless you're familiar and comfortable with the sound of early, pre-tape recordings on shellac (which will usually include a degree of hiss, wobble and surface noise no matter how good the source and the engineer), I would never, ever recommend one of these as a first choice. Once you're used to them, though, they can be revelatory - for example, Naxos has issued a big-hearted Fritz Kreisler performance of a Mozart concerto from 1924 that still simply smokes just about everyone who's come along since (despite the dim sound of the orchestra, the soloist sounds vivid and present), and Schabel's Beethoven remains in a class of its own. So what should you do? Investigate. Experiment. Buy a few inexpensive CDs and find out which composers, orchestras and performers you like. (Here's a tip - NO orchestra is infallible, no matter what anyone says... but the Cleveland Orchestra is the closest thing to perfection I ever expect to hear.) Ask questions, here and at the store. When you're looking for a specific piece, flip through the Penguin Guide (almost every store has one): They'll offer descriptions of a number of different recordings of the piece, and you can choose which one sounds most to your liking. There's even a Penguin guide devoted exclusively to budget-priced recordings. You can also read through many CD reviews online at Gramophone magazine's website (www.gramophone.co.uk) and at Classics Today (www.classicstoday.com). Oh, and if you see a version of Messiaen's Quartet for the End of Time performed by *any* orchestra whatsoever, I'd be wary: It's a quartet. ;-) In all seriousness, the Naxos recording features violinist Scott St. John, which is a pretty fair indicator of quality; I haven't heard it, but the reviews were good. If you can find it, the best recorded performance in many, many ways is the RCA recording by Tashi (Richard Stoltzman, Ida Kavafian, Peter Serkin and Fred Sherry). Other good performances currently available are the full-price Decca recording by Joshua Bell, Michael Collins, Steven Isserlis and Olli Mustonen and the mid-price recordings led by pianists Michel Beroff (EMI) and Daniel Barenboim (Deutsche Grammophon). I'm pretty fond of the Koch recording by Christoph Eschenbach and the Houston Symphony Chamber Players - but then, they're my old home team and I'm probably nostalgic. Surprisingly, given his fine recordings of Messiaen's orchestral music, the recent Myung-Whun Chung recording on Deutsche Grammophon is to be avoided at any price. Steve Smith ssmith36@sprynet.com

Needless to say, the diffrences are huge. When I was getting into orchestras, my polcy was to buy Pierre Boulez renditions, and also, as Iwas modtly buying Stravinsky, his own recordings. It's a policy I'm still happy with, although Abbado, Ozawa, Sinopoli, Bernstein, Gardener and others have also delighted me. I think you should think more in terms of conductor then orchestras. As for chamber pieces, I do not have that much experience. My girlfriend has a recording of the Messiaen I like very much - I forgot who playes on it, it's some french ensemble, the disc is on Erato. It's very joyful and abstract, and I like it very much. Marcin ----- Original Message ----- From: Kris Visser To: zorn-list@mailman.xmission.com Sent: Monday, December 09, 2002 7:51 PM Subject: classical orchestras Again a question from me. but really, it's just a small one. I was thinking of buying some classical music, but as I don't buy classical music frequently, I realize that there are a lot of different renditions of the same piece by different orchestras. For example: I saw Messiaen's Quartet pour le fin de temps for really cheap. I was thinking that maybe the reason why it's cheap is because it's a performance by a bad orchestra (2nd hand instruments maybe?). To the people on this list who do listen to classical music frequently: does it matter which rendition I choose? Maybe it's different for each person. Or should I buy the earliest recorded performance of a piece? Or maybe there is an orchestra that you recommend, or disrecommend? Is there an orchestra that I can always trust on? Or should I just buy the cheapest cd? What should I do? Any help is appriciated. Kris