Overview of the Greats – Orchestral

The Best Espana on Record?

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Chabrier Available Now

UPDATE 2026

The part down below about Londons numbered from 6400 to 6500 being superior is not something we would agree with any longer.

UPDATE 2021

Ansermet’s performance of Espana is still our favorite — nothing in our experience can touch it, musically or sonically.

As of 2022 we slightly prefer the famous Argenta recording for Decca that’s on the TAS List, CS 6006.

Both are wonderful and both belong in any serious audiophile collection of orchestral music.

We created a special section for recordings of this quality. Classical and orchestral records that we’ve auditioned and found to have the best performances with the highest quality sound can be found here.

This has been a favorite recording of ours here at Better Records for a very long time, since at least the mid-’90s or thereabouts. We’ve mentioned how much we like the sound of Londons with catalog numbers ranging from about 6400 to 6500 or so (which are simply Decca recordings from the mid-’60s), and this one (CS 6438) is one of the best reasons to hold that view.

(more…)

What We Think We Know about Beethoven’s Symphony No. 6

More of the Music of Ludwig van Beethoven

In our opinion this is the best sounding Beethoven 6th Symphony ever recorded. It is the most beautiful of them all, and has long been my personal favorite of the nine Beethoven composed.

Ansermet’s performance is clearly definitive to my ear as well. The gorgeous hall the Suisse Romande recorded in was possibly the best recording venue of its day, possibly of all time; more amazing sounding recordings were made there than any other hall we know of.

There is a richness to the sound that exceeds all others, yet clarity and transparency are not sacrificed in the least.

It’s as wide, deep and three-dimensional as any, which is of course all to the good, but what makes the sound of these recordings so special is the weight and power of the brass and the timbral accuracy of the instruments in every section.

We have a section of classical recordings that we nominate for the best performances with top quality sound, and this record is of course one of its founding members.

(more…)

Falla / Three-Cornered Hat – We Changed Our Minds

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Falla Available Now

In our review from 2010, we wrote:

Falla’s Three Cornered Hat is positively WONDERFUL on this copy (A++), and the Sinfonia Sevillana by Turina on side two is every bit as good. The second suite on side one is particularly lovely — check out how rich and full the sound is.

Side two has a HUGE soundstage, as wide as they come. The sound is very rich and full of audiophile colors — this is the kind of record that you’re going to love playing for your audio pals!  

Argenta brings the authentic Spanish flavor out in these works. Like so many audiophile reviewers have over the years, you may find these performances definitive.

The strings on the first side are a bit dry to start, like the sound many of you will recognize from Mercury’s classical records. Still, there’s much to like about the sound and you’ll have a very hard time finding a copy that’s any better. Most pressings do not have such an extended top end, and that quality here really brings this music to life.

UPDATE 2025

We played a copy of CS 6050 not long ago and were not at all pleased with the sound. You can read more about it here.

An orchestral record with dry strings? Not our idea of good sound.

But who else reviewing records these days even notices these kinds of things?

The De Burgos performance for EMI in 1964 and the Ansermet for Decca from 1961 (CS 6224) are both better recordings and our two current favorites, with the Ansermet getting the nod due to its wonderful energy and exciting performance.

There are about 150 orchestral recordings we think offer the best performances with the highest quality sound. Both are  deserving of a place on that list.

(more…)

For Concerto No. 1, This Is the Way the Piano Should Sound

Hot Stamper Living Stereo Classical and Orchestral Titles Available Now

We love the huge, solid and powerful sound of the piano on this recording. This piano has weight and heft. As a result, it sounds like a real piano.

For some reason, a great many Rubinstein recordings are not capable of reproducing those all-important qualities in the sound of the piano.

Those are, as I hope everyone understands by now, the ones we don’t sell. If the piano in a piano concerto recording doesn’t sound solid and powerful, what is the point of playing such a record?

Or, to be more accurate, what is the point of an audiophile playing such a record? (Those of you who would like to avoid bad sounding vintage classical and orchestra records have come to the right place. We’ve compiled a very long list of them precisely for that purpose, and we’ve been adding to it regularly.)

No doubt Kenneth Wilkinson made sure the recording captured the weight of the piano he was listening to as it played all those years ago in the wonderful acoustics of Kingsway Hall.

The strings have lovely Living Stereo (Decca-engineered) texture as well.

As befits a Wilkinson recording from 1961, there is no shortage of clarity to balance out the Tubey Magical warmth and richness.

When you add in the tremendous hall space, weight and energy, this becomes a Demo Disc orchestral recording by any standard.

Notes from a 2024 Shootout

Our notes above point out that:

(more…)

Pictures at an Exhibition – An Overview

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Mussorgsky Available Now

There is a slightly multi-miked quality to this recording. If you’ve been playing true Golden Age records all day you will notice that the instruments are more naturally and correctly spaced and sized on those recordings.

But, this is still a KNOCKOUT record which is guaranteed to bring any stereo to its knees. The dynamics, the deep bass and the sheer power of the orchestra have to be heard to be believed.

What does the typical EMI pressing of this album sound like?

Not good. Sour brass, smeary or shrill strings, lacking in bass — mid-hall dead-as-a-doornail sound is fairly typical.

Almost all the copies I’ve played are spacious, but so what?

The sound of the instruments is often wrong and in my book that trumps any benefits concerning soundstaging or depth.

But the best Hot Stamper pressings give you the presence and immediacy you need to get involved in the work.

The strings on the better copies have rosiny texture.

The brass has weight — not the full measure of an RCA or London recording, but at least you get the impression that those instruments are trying to sound correct.

And the bass drum really goes deep, unlike many of the Golden Age recordings I’ve heard.

(more…)

Select Commentaries and Letters for The Planets

Hot Stamper Pressings of Orchestral Spectaculars Available Now

Below you will find a number of the more popular commentaries we’ve written about the various recordings of this wonderful piece of music.

Included here is also a letter from a customer who spent some time with a Hot Stamper pressing of our favorite recording of The Planets.

We’ve been actively auditioning recordings of Holst’s Masterpiece since the 70s. We finally landed on the one we think offers the audiophile connoisseur the best combination of sound and performance, Andre Previn’s with The London Symphony in 1974.

(There are about 150 other orchestral recordings we think offer the best performances with the highest quality sound.  Check them out when you have time.)

This Recording of The Planets Has “Blockbuster Sound,” For Better and For Worse

The Planets – MoFi and UHQR Reviewed


(more…)

The Best Danse Macabre on Record

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Saint-Saens Available Now

Saint-Saens’ symphonic poem, Danse Macabre, the second piece on the second side, is the heart of the album and its raison d’être for us. This is where the real fireworks can be found, although that’s not really fair as there are fireworks aplenty on both sides.

What we have here is the best Danse Macabre we have ever played.

We have always been fans of Gibson’s performance on the legendary Witches’ Brew. As good as that recording may be, this one is clearly superior in practically every way — it’s bigger, clearer, richer, more resolving, more spacious, more real and, to my surprise, more EXCITING and involving.

If you own a copy of LSC 2225, hopefully not the awful Classic Records Heavy Vinyl pressing, you need to hear what Fremaux and the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra have accomplished on this wonderful 70s EMI.

Audiophiles (especially those of us with large dynamic speakers) have always been drawn to the biggest and most exciting orchestral spectaculars, and we have plenty on the site at all times to satisfy the need to hear these kinds of records at their properly-mastered, properly-pressed best.

Why spend money on another underperforming modern reissue that you will end up rarely playing when much more powerful and involving sound can be found on our site, sound so good it has the potential to change your life.

Four Exceptional Orchestral Showpieces

The Sorcerer’s Apprentice (Dukas)

This piece opens the side. There is depth and richness to beat the band, as well as clarity and tonal correctness that let you forget the recording and just enjoy the music.

A superb performance as well, as good as any we know of. And the sound is the equal of the best recordings we’ve played.

Espana. Rhapsody For Orchestra (Chabrier)

As good as Fremaux is, I think the Ansermet (CS 6438) might still have the edge, but both are so good that it might just come down to a matter of taste. You cannot go wrong with either.

UPDATE 2023

And now we actually prefer the famous Argenta recording for Decca that’s on the TAS List, CS 6006.

(more…)

Suite Espanola – How Do the Remastered Pressings Sound?

Decca and London Hot Stamper Pressings Available Now

In 2011 we made the (usually pointless) effort to compare a London pressing to the 180 gram Speakers Corner reissue which we were carrying at the time. We noted simply that the Heavy Vinyl pressing “was a joke next to this copy.”

I wish I could tell you in what way it was a joke — we try to be specific about the shortcomings of these records, which is why we publish our notes for some of them — but the old notes are long gone.

Naturally, we don’t have the reissue to play this time around. Still, we are confident that the results of any comparison would be the same.

Mark Lehman in the Absolute Sound gave the ORG Heavy Vinyl remastering Five Stars, having this to say about the sound:

ORG’s 45rpm remastering is terrific (as indeed are all of the ORG vinyl reissues I’ve heard). Comparison with the late- 60s London LP on which the Suite first appeared reveals sharpened and clarified attacks and articulations, more tightly focused individual strands, fuller and warmer string choirs, more resonant brass, more pillowy air around flutes, clarinets, and oboes, and more nuance and opulence in the orchestral blends.

The total effect is to make Albeniz’s composition even more sweeping, rhapsodic, richly hued, evocative, and involving—and that’s saying something, considering how good the sonics are on this recording’s first incarnation.

If only any of this were true!

We readily admit we have never played the ORG pressing and have no plans to, but when has a Heavy Vinyl pressing ever had any of the qualities described above, let alone in such abundance?

Never in our experience, and our experience extends to more than four hundred of them.

Enough Already

Enough about records we’ve never played. Let’s discuss some of the pressings of this very recording that we actually have played, it being a favorite of ours for which we have done a number of shootouts.

The Super Analogue remaster from the 90s was awful. I would give it an F if I were grading it today.

The Speakers Corner pressing earned a B grade from us, which makes it one of the better releases on that label. I would guess that one or two out of ten would rate a B. I don’t know of any record of theirs that rates a grade higher than B.

Using letter grades, our grading system of White Hot, Super Hot and Hot would translate to something like A Plus, A and A Minus.

Which means that there is no Heavy Vinyl pressing, from any era, on any label, that should be able to beat any Hot Stamper pressing on our site, and we back that up with a 100% money back guarantee.

UPDATE 2024

Stop the presses and hold your horses.

As of 2024 we actually know of more than one Shootout Winning title pressed on modern Heavy Vinyl. You can read about one of them here.

There is another one as well and we will be writing about that one soon.

We now return you to our old commentary.

(more…)

What We’ve Learned About Peer Gynt Over the Last 20 Years

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Edvard Grieg Available Now

The commentary reproduced down below is from 2005. It is unlikely that the pressing we liked at the time, a Stereo Treasury LP of the famous Fjeldstad performance, would come anywhere close to winning a shootout these days. We simply don’t buy them anymore. We stick to the pressings that have done well for us over the last twenty years in shootout after shootout.

Peer Gynt is a Masterpiece that deserves a place at the heart of any classical collection of the greatest recordings of all time.

If you want to improve the quality of pressings in your collection, by far the best way to go about it is to start doing your own shootouts. A great deal of this blog is dedicated to helping you learn how to do that.

Oddly enough, there actually are budget reissues that win shootouts. They just happen to be Ace of Diamonds pressings and not Stereo Treasurys. (You can see a picture of the pressing we like at the bottom of this post.)

The Wonderful Peer Gynt

Our favorite recording of Peer Gynt is the one by Otto Gruner-hegge and the Oslo Philharmonic from 1959.

The only other reading of the work with top quality sonics is the one that won our proto-shootout twenty years ago, the one with Fjeldstad and the London Symphony Orchestra.

Speaking of budget reissues, we are on record as having been fans of a great many budget classical LPs stretching back decades. My catalogs from the 90s were full of reissues with exceptionally good sound.

Doing things as we do them now, by following rigorous testing protocols, has made it possible for us to discover some budget pressings that are so well-mastered they have the potential — accent on the word potential — to win shootouts.

(more…)

Maazel’s Pines of Rome Is Another Title Not Fit for a Super Disc List

Hot Stamper Pressings of The Pines of Rome Available Now

Sonic Grade: C (at best)

I found a bit of commentary in a listing for Scheherazade, and right away it was clear to me that the shootout we did for that title showed us a recording that had much in common with the one we had done more recently for The Pines of Rome.

Here it is, with the necessary changes having been made.

We did a monster shootout for this music in 2021, one we had been planning for more than twenty years. On hand were quite a few copies of the Reiner on RCA; the Ansermet on London; the Maazel on Decca and London (the Decca being on the TAS List), the Kempe on Readers Digest, and quite a few others we felt had potential.

The only recordings that held up all the way through — the last movement being a real Ball Breaker, for both the engineers and musicians — were those by Reiner and Kempe. This was disappointing considering how much time and money we spent finding, cleaning and playing about twenty or so other pressings.

We learned from that first big go around something that we think will remain true for the foreseeable future: the 1960 Reiner recording with the Chicago Symphony on RCA just can’t be beat.

Could other pressings be better sounding? Of course they could.

Would we ever buy another copy? Not a chance.

The notes for the Decca pressing I played, mastered by G, Ted Burkett, can be seen above.

Hey, here’s an idea.

Why don’t you buy a bunch of them and see if any of them do not have the problems described on my notes.

If you find a good one, please let me know the stampers so I can go out and find one myself.

The above is of course all in good fun. We both know that there is not a snowball’s chance in hell that anyone reading this commentary is going to go out and buy some Decca pressings of The Pines of Rome, clean them up, play them one by one and then critique their strengths and weaknesses.

The most likely thing is that, if you have any Decca pressing of Maazel’s Pines, it’s sitting on a shelf collecting dust. Odds are it has not been played in a very long time.

Which should tell you something. Good records get played and bad ones sit on shelves.

(more…)