BEST brand for Classical Recordings?

Jorge: If you are just getting started building a classical musical collection, here are a couple of suggestions. First, look for a book titled "The NPR Guide to Classical Music", or words to that effect. One of the main music critics has evaluated the best recordings for many of the major composers and their best-known works. The book is a graet starting point for "newbies". Second suggestion: try the RCA "Living Stereo" re-issue series and the Mercury "Living Presence" re-issue series. Both feature great recordings from the 1950's and early 1960's, and both series have some superb recordings. Finally, as to labels:
there are already some good suggestions from others. Over the past 40 years or so, the following labels have had some fine recordings: Decca, London, Teldec, Harmonia Mundi, BIS, Lyrita, Deutsche Grammophon (although their recording quality was sometimes not the best during the 1970's and early 1980's), Telarc (usually on the cutting edge of recording technology). There are also some fine classical recordings on Dorian and Chesky.

In my earlier post, I recommended a book, but did not have the title exactly correct. The name of the book is: "The NPR Guide To Building A Classical CD Collection", and it is written by Ted Libbey. It was re-printed in 1999. The book does an excellent job of reviewing some 350 recordings that form the core of a good classical collection, and recommends the best recordings of each of the works. Hope it helps.