mendevioli

Violin Concertos Are Ideal for Testing Table Setup

Hot Stamper Pressings Featuring the Violin Available Now

This is one of the ALL TIME GREAT violin concerto records. In Ruggiero Ricci’s hands both works are nothing short of magical. If you want to know why people drool over Golden Age recordings, listen to the violin. Careful, when you hear it you may find yourself drooling too.

The staging of the orchestra and violin is exactly the way we want to hear it in our heads. Whether it would really sound this way in a concert hall is impossible to say — concert halls all sound different — but the skill and the emotion of the playing is communicated beautifully on this LP. This is a sweetheart of a record, full of the Tubey Magic for which London recordings are justly famous.

As we noted above, engineering took place in the legendary Kingsway Hall. There is a richness to the sound of the strings that is exceptional, yet clarity and transparency are not sacrificed in the least.

VTA and the Violin

This is truly The Perfect Turntable setup disc. When your VTA, azimuth, tracking weight and anti-skate are correct, this is the record that will make it clear to you that your efforts have paid off.

What to listen for you ask? With the proper adjustment the harmonics of the strings will sound extended and correct, neither hyped up nor dull; the wood body of the instrument will be more audibly “woody”; the fingering at the neck will be noticeable but will not call attention to itself in an unnatural way. In other words, as you adjust your setup, the violin will sound more and more right.

And you can’t really know how right it can sound until you go through hours of experimentation with all the forces that affect the way the needle rides the groove. Without precise VTA adjustment there is almost no way this record will do everything it’s capable of doing. There will be hardness, smear, sourness, thinness — something will be off somewhere. With total control over your arm and cartridge setup, these problems will all but vanish. (Depending on the quality of the equipment of course.)

We harp on all aspects of reproduction for a reason. When you have done the work, records like this are nothing less than GLORIOUS.

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Mendelssohn / Violin Concerto / Rybar

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Felix Mendelssohn Available Now

This review is from ten or fifteen years ago. If you see the album for cheap in the bins, pick it up and tell us what you think of it. Our favorite recordings of the work by Ricci, Heifetz and Campoli can be found here.

This Whitehall budget reissue stereo pressing has SUPERB Hot Stamper sound on both sides and a performance by Peter Rybar that can hold its own against any you may have heard.   

This recording easily beats most of the vintage Shaded Dogs, Mercurys and London records that we’ve ever played here at Better Records, and it was released on vinyl by a relatively obscure budget label that most audiophiles have never even heard of and would probably not want to be caught dead with.

Which is a good reason to judge records by playing them, not reading about them, on the net or in magazines. The sound of this record is so wonderful that, had it been a rare Shaded Dog, Merc or London it would have sold for something approaching twice the money we are asking here. In my experience relatively few of those recordings are as good as this one.

Whitehall

The best Whitehall records can be superb, but finding them on quiet vinyl is next to impossible. This copy plays Mint Minus Minus which is about as quiet as any we have heard.

Side One

A++ Super Hot Stamper sound, rich and Tubey Magical, smooth and lovely in all respects, with a tonally correct violin that’s neither bright nor edgy. We love the sound here.

Side Two

A++, with an especially rich sounding orchestra. Love those lower strings.

The Hebrides Overture, the coupling work at the end of this side, is not quite as good. We called it A+ to A++. It gets a bit congested when loud.

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Mendelssohn and Bruch / Violin Concertos / Ricci

More of the music of Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847)

Hot Stamper Pressings Featuring the Violin

  • With two outstanding sides, we guarantee you’ve never heard the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto sound as good as it does here, and the Bruch Concerto on the second side is every bit as good
  • The glorious sound of these truly great 1958 All Tube “Decca Tree” recordings from Kingsway Hall is faithfully captured in all its beauty on this disc, and once the needle hits the groove it won’t take you long to hear it
  • It’s also fairly quiet at Mint Minus Minus, a grade that even our most well-cared-for vintage classical titles have trouble playing at
  • With sonic grades like these, you can be sure this pressing will be competitive with nearly all comers, including the performances by Heifetz, Rybar, and others that have impressed in the past
  • The violin is so sweet and present, so rich, natural and real, you will forget you’re listening to a record at all

This is one of the ALL TIME GREAT violin concerto records. In Ruggiero Ricci’s hands both works are nothing short of magical. If you want to know why people drool over Golden Age recordings, listen to the violin. Take care, when you hear it you may find yourself drooling too.

The staging of the orchestra and violin is exactly the way we want to hear it in our heads. Whether it would really sound this way in a concert hall is impossible to say — concert halls all sound different — but the skill and the emotion of the playing is communicated beautifully on this LP. This is a sweetheart of a record, full of the Tubey Magic for which London recordings are justly famous.

As we noted above, engineering took place in the legendary Kingsway Hall. There is a richness to the sound of the strings that is exceptional, yet clarity and transparency are not sacrificed in the least.

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Classic Records and Audio Progress

Hot Stamper Pressings Featuring the Violin Available Now

An audiophile hall of shame pressing and another Classic Records Classical LP reviewed and found wanting.

Classic Records ruined this album, as anyone who has played some of their classical reissues should have expected. Their version is dramatically more aggressive, shrill and harsh than the Shaded Dogs we’ve played, with almost none of the sweetness, richness and ambience that the best RCA pressings have in such abundance.

In fact their pressing is just plain awful, like most of the classical recordings they remastered, and should be avoided at any price.

Apparently, most audiophiles (including audiophile record reviewers) have never heard a top quality classical recording reproduced properly. If they had, Classic Records would have gone out of business immediately after producing their first three Living Stereo titles, all of which were dreadful and labeled as such by us way back in 1994. I’m not sure why the rest of the audiophile community was so easily fooled, but I can say that we weren’t, at least when it came to their classical releases.

(We admit to having made plenty of mistaken judgments about their jazz and rock, and we have the We Was Wrong entries to prove it.)

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Mendelssohn and Bruch / The World of the Great Classics, Vol. 3

More of the music of Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847)

Hot Stamper Pressings Featuring the Violin

  • A superb Decca reissue with Double Plus (A++) sound from the first note to the last
  • A spectacular Demo Disc Quality Orchestral recording – big, clear, rich, dynamic, transparent and energetic
  • The violin is so sweet and present, so rich, natural and real, you will forget you’re listening to a record at all
  • The glorious sound of these truly great 1958 All Tube “Decca Tree” recordings from Kingsway Hall is faithfully captured in all its beauty on this very disc

This is one of the ALL TIME GREAT violin concerto records. In Ruggiero Ricci’s hands both works are nothing short of magical. If you want to know why people drool over Golden Age recordings, listen to the violin. Careful, when you hear it you may find yourself drooling too.

The staging of the orchestra and violin is exactly the way we want to hear it in our heads. Whether it would really sound this way in a concert hall is impossible to say — concert halls all sound different — but the skill and the emotion of the playing is communicated beautifully on this LP. This is a sweetheart of a record, full of the Tubey Magic for which London recordings are justly famous.

As we noted above, engineering took place in the legendary Kingsway Hall. There is a richness to the sound of the strings that is exceptional, yet clarity and transparency are not sacrificed in the least.

(more…)

Mendelssohn – Violin Concerto / Bruch – Scottish Fantasia – Campoli

More of the music of Max Bruch (1938-1920)

More of the music of Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847)

  • An excellent London pressing with Double Plus (A++) sound from the first note to the last
  • This Stereo Treasury LP may not win shootouts, but it is guaranteed to handily beat the pants off any Heavy Vinyl violin concerto record ever made
  • The Mendelssohn on London (CS 6010) with Ricci is also excellent, but ten times harder to find in clean condition and quite a bit more expensive if you do find one
  • The Scottish Fantasy on side two contains some of the best sound we know for the work, close to our favorite, the Heifetz on Living Stereo (LSC 2603)
  • One of the truly great 1959 All Tube Kenneth Wilkinson “Decca Tree” recordings in Kingsway Hall, captured faithfully in all its beauty on this very disc
  • Referring to the Mendelssohn, Gramophon noted: “[Campoli’s] virtuosity in the finale are as self-evident as is the excellence of the accompaniment under Sir Adrian Boult. There are many felicitous touches and the distinguished soloist plays magnificently throughout.”
  • If you’re a fan of Campoli’s, this 1959 album belongs in your collection, along with quite a few others, if only we could fine them
  • The complete list of titles from 1959 that we’ve reviewed to date can be found here.

As can be seen from the grades above, The Scottish Fantasy on side two was not remotely as good sounding as the Mendelssohn on side one. The best pressings for that work came on the London Stereo Treasury label surprisingly enough. As good as those later British pressings were, the best of which earned the full Three Pluses for its side two, none of them had quite the magic of the Mendelssohn found here. (more…)

Mendelssohn – Violin Concerto / Bruch – Scottish Fantasia – Campoli / Boult

More of the music of Max Bruch (1938-1920)

More of the music of Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847)

  • This stunning London Blueback LP presents the complete Mendelssohn Violin Concerto with some of the best sound we have ever heard for the work 
  • The Mendelssohn on London (CS 6010) with Ricci is also excellent, but hard to find and expensive if you do
  • The Scottish Fantasy on side two contains some of the best sound we know for the work, close to our favorite, the Heifetz on Living Stereo (LSC 2603)
  • One of the truly great 1959 All Tube Kenneth Wilkinson “Decca Tree” recordings in Kingsway Hall, captured faithfully in all its beauty on this very disc
  • Referring to the Mendelssohn, Gramophon noted: “[Campoli’s] virtuosity in the finale are as self-evident as is the excellence of the accompaniment under Sir Adrian Boult. There are many felicitous touches and the distinguished soloist plays magnificently throughout.”
  • If you’re a fan of Campoli’s, this 1959 album belongs in your collection, along with quite a few others, if only we could fine them
  • The complete list of titles from 1959 that we’ve reviewed to date can be found here.

As can be seen from the grades above, The Scottish Fantasy on side two was not remotely as good sounding as the Mendelssohn on side one. The best pressings for that work came on the London Stereo Treasury label surprisingly enough. As good as those later British pressings were, the best of which earned the full Three Pluses for its side two, none of them had quite the magic of the Mendelssohn found here. (more…)

Holiday For Strings / Fiedler / Boston Pops

More Music Conducted by Arthur Fiedler

More Living Stereo Recordings

  • Holiday For Strings finally arrives on the site with stunning Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound throughout
  • This is a true Demo Disc quality recording, with lovely Living Stereo strings – close your eyes and the three-dimensional soundstaging will make your speakers disappear
  • This is a sweetheart of a recording – big, clear, rich, dynamic, transparent and energetic, and will surely put to shame most of the Living Stereo pressings you own (unless you bought them from us)
  • “Nowhere in the world is there a surer guarantee of more richly varied musical delights than that promised by this conductor’s precise baton, his infallible ear and memory, the prodigious range of his taste, his interpretative verve.”
  • Yet Another Record We’ve Discovered with (Potentially) Excellent Sound

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Mendelssohn and Prokofiev – Violin Concertos / Heifetz / Munch

More of the music of Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847)

More of the music of Sergei Prokofiev (1891-1953)

  • Both sides of this early Shaded Dog pressing have outstanding Living Stereo sound for Mendelssohn and Prokofiev’s concertos, earning Double Plus (A++) grades or BETTER
  • It’s also fairly quiet at Mint Minus Minus, a grade that even our most well-cared-for vintage classical titles have trouble playing at
  • A truly superb recording with huge, spacious, dynamic, lively sound – Tubey Magical richness is a big plus too
  • These performances by Heifetz and the Boston Symphony under the baton of Charles Munch are some of the best we’ve ever heard – Heifetz is on fire with passion for these exciting pieces
  • As usual for a Living Stereo Heifetz violin concerto recording, he is front and center, with every movement of his bow clearly audible without being hyped-up in the least
  • Prokofiev’s Violin Concerto takes up all of this Nearly Triple Plus (A++ to A+++) side two and is close to the BEST we have ever heard, right up there with our Shootout Winner

No violin concerto recording can be considered to have the real Living Stereo sound if the violin isn’t right, and fortunately this violin is very very right, with the kind of rosiny texture and immediacy that brings the music to life right in your very own listening room.

The Prokofiev concerto is a longtime member of the TAS Super Disc List.

String Tone

It’s practically impossible to hear that kind of string sound on any recording made in the last thirty years (and this of course includes practically everything pressed on Heavy Vinyl). It may be a lost art but as long as we have these wonderful vintage pressings to play, it’s an art that is not being lost on us.

It’s also 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 timbral accuracy of the instruments in every section.

I don’t think the engineers could have cut this record any better — it has all the orchestral magic one could ask for, as well as the resolving power, clarity and presence that are missing from so many Golden Age records.

This is the kind of record that will make you want to take all your heavy vinyl classical pressings and put them in storage. They cannot begin to sound the way this record sounds. (Before you put them in storage or on Ebay, please play them against this pressing so that you can be confident in your decision to rid yourself of their insufferable mediocrity.)

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