Well, I started collecting records about the time DGG became just DG. 
I still have some of my father’s 10" DGG records from the 50s.
I have the Previn, but I also have two video versions of the Royal Ballet performing it. I have the Nureyev Fonteyn film from the 60s and a much more recent recording of a stage performance from the marvelous Royal Ballet box set of 15 Blu-Ray discs. Without a doubt the best classical music purchase I made last year.
I’ve watched most of the ballets in the box, but I’m saving R&J for last.
I’ve seen several other productions live.
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The new recording of Turandot. A real studio recording, in spectacular sound, with one of the best casts that could be assembled today, and for the first time in a commercial recording, with Alfano’s original longer finale. I’ve always thought that there was a stark difference between Puccini’s music and Alfano’s completion (at once a different mood, and at the same time denser but less interesting) and this longer finale doesn’t change that, but the text makes a lot more sense for both Calaf and Turandot. The soloists have both power and sensitivity, and this recording overall reminds me more of the Leinsdorf with Nilsson and Tebaldi, than later recordings. Even Kaufmann is not a mile off from Bjoerling - who would have expected that?
Highly recommended.
Cheers
EJ
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This is my copy of Leinsdorf’s Turandot - do give this a listen if you can, it is spectacularly good despite some routine conducting.
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This definitely needs a listen😊
And mine… 
You pay your money and you take your choice. 
All of 'em are great.
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Excellent, too, of course. Uniquely talented as she was I’ve never really loved Sutherland’s voice, but I still have a highres version of this I’ve not listened to, yet - will do so shortly.
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Yes, well she could certainly mangle the Italian language…
But a great pair of lungs !
The Leinsdorf recording was released as an SACD in the Living Stereo series.
Cheers
EJ
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I recognise that cover very well, but will have to check whether I have the set on LPs or CDs. (Some might suggest that I have ‘too much stuff’ upstairs!)
Thielemann’s Bruckner 9th was taped during the Salzburg festival and although the sound is consistent with earlier volumes, the clarity is notch below the others.
If you enjoy his 8th or 5th, you’ll love this 9th as well. Thielemann is more a man of tableaux (Sinopoli) than a builder of cathedrals (Karajan) but also, like in the 5th, achieves a depth and mystery that sets him apart.
Cheers,
EJ
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I have the LP version that was reissued as a limited (1750) numbered edition some years ago. Although it’s a box set, each of the original albums is sleeved in a facsimile jacket of the original (they aren’t fancy Stoughton jackets, just cheap cardstock ones). I paid about $160 for the 9-LP set, so that was pretty decent.
I agree, the Bernstein/VPO “Eroica” is a good one. I’m playing it now.
James Galway and Martha Argerich - ‘Sonatas for Flute and Piano’ (1975). Bought last Saturday from local Oxfam Books and Music on vinyl. Hadn’t heard of this one. Purchased on the basis of Martha Argerich but with James Galway before his more popular music days.
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That’s an intriguing looking record, which I’ve never seen before. Don’t forget that, before taking up popular music for the masses on TV shows and the like, James Galway was Karajan’s principal flute in the Berlin Philharmonic. (I don’t think that Galway’s irreverence suited Herbie much.)
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Both exist in flute and violin versions. I have both versions of the Prokofiev but only the violin version of the Franck.
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Thanks for the info Graham. Wow, I didn’t know he had been in the Berlin Phil.
Schumann’s chamber music, and in particular the op.41 quartets tend to sound a bit monochrome in many performances. Especially in this respect, I found the recording by Quatuor Modigliani an ear opener - warm, colourful, and very lyrical. Too french? Perhaps but I keep coming back to this one.
Cheers
EJ
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