Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1024034 in Books
• Published on: 2001-09-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 1330 pages

Synopsis
Whether it's buying your first opera, discovering the music of Arvo Part or searching for the best recording of Mahler's Fifth Symphony, you need the Classical Good CD Guide. An invaluable reference tool for anyone interested in classical music on disc, the Classical Good CD Guide features thousands of recordings rated and reviewed by the world's leading music critics. It includes advice on building a basic library, composer biographies, facts on the greatest works, additional recommendations, suggested further listening and more. The Cassical Good CD Guide enables you to make the most informed choice from the vast array of classical recordings available today.

Customer Reviews

A fine guide to classical CDs - but not all of them
The Gramophone Guide and the Penguin Guide have been my constant companions for years and I feel that the anorak gramophile needs both. The Gramophone Guide is published each year, whereas the Penguin Guide comes out in two parts. The Gramophone Guide has a section for collections which are only found in the Penguin Year Book (PG).

The text of the Gramophone guide appears to be extracted from reviews to be found in the Gramophone magazine. They are usually much more detailed than in the PG but there is a feeling of cut and paste about it. This is a minor point and when, for example, considering the version of a Bruckner symphony to buy, the Gramophone guide is of more help.

On the other hand, the PG has far more discs for you to choose from, more composers and more works of a given composer. Neither Ginastera nor Gurney is to be found in the Gramophone Guide, and if you are a Kodaly fan, the PG has over 20 CDs listed, whereas the Gramophone Guide has about five. This is not always the case - the Finnish composer Saariah has an entry in the Gramophone Guide but not the PG. In books roughly the same size, this is bound to be so - more detail, fewer records, but you should bear this in mind.

Two additional features which should be mentioned are the essays on the music of different eras - from early music to the avant garde. Michael Oliver does a nice thumbnail sketch on serialism which does not, of course, make the music sound any nicer. There are also mini-biographies of the beginning of each composer section.

Highly recommended - not only will you find your best CD but browsing through it might easily lead you up new and rewarding paths.

They could have made more use of so many pages
Since I agree with most of the opinions of the other reviewer, I will try to highlight some other points, good and bad:

* As with the Penguin Guide, be prepared to for too many high praises (and pages) for English composers and performers - especially conductors. The number of works by British composers listed in the basic recommended library listing, although it is useful as a general guide, is simply too much (compared to, for example, how many works by Schubert, Mozart, Dvorak were listed).

* The coverage of contemporary composers is quite limited. Even though you can locate most of the names, there are very few recommendations of their major works - let alone alternatives.

* Murray Perahia cannot do any wrong according to these critics. So for many keyboard works (like the Mozart and Bach concerti as well as some works by Chopin) you are offered only Perahia, with an assertion that he is the best, with no other worthy alternatives.

* A major advantage, I find, of this over the Penguin Guide is that the three discs rating (their highest rating) is awarded to relatively few discs. Thus, you can be more confident in buying a three disc rated disc here than, say, a rosette recommendation from the Penguin Guide.

* I would have much preferred them to have shrunk the collections section (which are usually not useful for library building or any other repertoire driven collection) and given more weight to contemporary composers. Although this is somewhat a personal preference, I have never used the collections section.

* Last, somewhat ironically, there are no reviews for some of the works listed in the "recommended basic library" listing; and for some others, there is only one recommended recording (while for other works not listed, there are multiple reviews).

I bought this just as it was released last year and my experience with the guide over this year - having made at least 50 purchases based on the reviews therin - has been most satisfying. For those who would want to be more selective and are on a limited budget, I would recommend this guide over the Penguin Guide.

A Quality Buy
Since buying a copy of the Gramophone 2001 Classical CD last year, it has been the biggest influence on my decisions when buying Classical music. The format is clear, and the reviews on all the CDs featured are very detailed, more so, I feel than its competitor, the Penguin Guide.

A slight drawback may be that some of the less usual repertoire is not featured. It does however review several little-known works too, such as the recording of the Saint-Saens complete Symphonies from EMI (which includes his two delightful unnumbered Symphonies as well as the better-known 3 numbered ones).

I would thoroughly recommend it to both veteran and novice collectors alike. As well as rating the performance & recordings, there is also a fairly reliable pricing system, so it is easier to directly compare the different recordings.