Classical Music for Aficionados

• From an internet review of Blomstedt’s new Beethoven Symphony cycle: “certainly among the greatest Beethoven cycles ever recorded.”
  
• I agree!

Fenmoore,

Try Presto Classical.

Also Amazon

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RowYzRTHTWA

"to boot he is taking our 1st violnist with him"

Thats one way to preserve talent!

Amen!!

Good idea!

@curiousjim 

Thanks for reviving this dormant thread. 
I agree, Hogwood is as good as any.

@rcprince 

Yes, it’s amazing how our taste can change like that.

@mahler123 

Ristenpart’s interpretations have managed to survive the HIP movement.  
Just a superb musician.  
Those Nonesuch LP’s are wonderful

My Nonesuch and Turnabout LP’s are still in excellent shape. As far as sound goes, with my new analog rig some, but not all, are audiophile quality. I use them to demonstrate the SQ of my set.

The amplifiers on my Triton 1 speakers’ subwoofers were broken by a power surge in my neighborhood. Consequently I’m not listening to much music with a lot of bass lately.
I’ve begun a project of listening to the Beethoven string quartets. So far I’ve listened to op. 18. Quartets. Beethoven’s genius is palpable in these works.  He devoured the classical style whole and spit out masterpieces that surpassed even Haydn and Mozart in invention. And this is to mention only one genre he worked with.

The op. 59 quartets are next on the agenda

Yes, I have headphones, but I still prefer the speakers.  But, you’re right, without the subwoofers the sound is definitely off, lacks body..    
‘Hopefully the amps will arrive today.

I just listened to the Hogwood version of the Mozart Requiem on my compromised speakers. I hadn’t heard this version previously. From what I could tell, it’s a really fine reading. The “Lacrymosa” is a bit shocking in its original version, quite different from Sussmeyer’s arrangement.  
My first encounter with the Requiem was with Krips and the Vienna Choir Boys. I literally wore out three LP’s, playing it every day for a very long time.  Such is my reverence for the work and Mozart.
My subwoofers should be installed tomorrow. Can’t wait to hear the Hogwood with them working.

Well, I had the amps replaced, and when the technician was through he noticed the polarity of the speaker cables was the conventional red to red and black to black formation. It just so happens that my Conrad-Johnson preamp is phase inverting, which means the cables should be black to black on one speaker and on the other speaker black to RED. I have known this since I bought the preamp many moons ago. But somehow (I don’t know when) the cables were reversed in the wrong formation.
All of a sudden the sound opened up magnificently when I played my records.
So, the bad turned into the good!

 The difference in sound I achieved by reversing the channels was nothing short of revelatory.

Check  the section on “absolute phase”

https://conradjohnson.com/owners-manuals/pv11man.pdf

On reading the manual carefully. It appears you are right. My technician, unbeknownst to me inserted them the correct way. I got lucky!

I would hate to tell you how many years I’ve been listening to my system out of phase. It’s since I bought the Conrad-Johnson pre.
What a revelation to hear everything anew!  It’s like the best upgrade I could buy.

VERY SAD!

Since bringing my speakers into phase (even with only one subwoofer!) the sound is maybe 90% better. It’s really hard to believe the difference.

Not only that, it’s changed the equation between analog and digital. Now analog is sounding palpably better than digital.

@simonmoon 

Thanks for the scientific explanation.    
Very interesting.   
 

The sound of the Triton 1’s is so unbelievably rich and detailed with one subwoofer that now I’m worried that when the amp for the second subwoofer gets installed. the sound won’t be as good.

Also I spoke too soon regarding the relative SQ of analog to digital..
Digital is also now starting to sound great as well.

I’ve always heard that one subwoofer is okay for a system.  What’s different about my situation is that the subwoofers are built in to my speakers. Theoretically. that would mean the subwooferless speaker would not reproduce the lower frequencies of that speaker, leaving a loss of quality.  But that does not seem to be the case.

I’m going to get a new subwoofer amp delivered today.  When it’s installed I’ll let you know.

@mahler123 

Sorry for the delay in answering.  Just rediscovered the thread.

Yes there is a big difference with two subwoofers.  The sound is much fuller.

I just compared four performances of Schumann’s masterpiece, the Symphonic Etudes.   Pogorelich, Richter Rubinstein and Pollini.  The results were very enlightening. Richter and Pogorelich, though representing two different worlds of interpretation, played with electric intensity, whereas Rubinstein was very musical, calm, but still effective, although he left out several variations in this live performance.  Pollini , surprisingly, was just dull, no excitement but indeed very capable. 
 Pogorelich, was, modernistically anti-Romantic in his approach, dry, without much use of pedal, yet incredibly impressive in intensity and technique.  Richter was more in the Romantic tradition with no less virtuosity.  Both pianists were in full command of the piano.  My preference was Pogorelich.

What also impressed me is how easy it is to compare solo players with regard to interpretation.  Orchestral performances are more tricky. The way an orchestra is recorded goes a long way towards your appreciation. You may prefer one recording over another due to how the sound effects you.  Sonics can cloud your perspective.