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Schubert
 Schubert: Symphony No. 9 "The Great" $3.96 I pay my attention on the You tube where Maestro Simon Rattle speak about his understanding and rendition of this Schubert' symphony. My opinion is that the orchestration's work is good but the quality of the sound (recording) is sadly poor. I hope Mister Rattle will be more demanding about this important side in the future.  Schubert: 8 Symphonies $30.98 Originally purchased with great anticipation from the 30 second excepts on the disk. Once they arrived, I found excitement fading as I played through the collection. Having enjoyed Franz Schubert's work in concert performance and personal recordings, the enjoyable style and melodies of Schubert's symphonies are familiar. Playing these recordings for the first time the outdated old & broken feel gave immediate dislike. Slowed themes, notably in the first movements of 8 and 9 hurt the performance. The works, written in Allegro, and yet performed in Grave` tempos. This direction only grows more tiresome moving through the disks. Tempos aside the phrasing and fruition of themes give the general feeling, the orchestra plays the notes but is unable to hear music from the notes. Not all bad, the performances of symphonies 5 & 6 on disk 3 are enjoyable, thought of keeping the set for these recordings. And, the interpretation of 1 & 2 in D/B are well done. As a whole, I returned the recordings, unhappy with the disregard of tempos and general music notations composed by Schubert. Finally, I will continue to look for the reference recordings of Schubert's beloved symphony collection.  Schubert: Greatest Hits $7.99 Fine re-masters of Leonard Berstein (on Schubert's "Unfinished,") and Eugene Ormandy (on most of the rest). I bought it so as to have Schubert's best works all in one place. Good enough to inspire me to purchase others in "the greatest hits series." Three stars |
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