Bargains

[teamsaint]

Have you noticed that chips aren't as cheap as chips anymore? At least they're not 'round my way. Last week I paid £1.85 for a penneth in a common or garden fish & chip shop. When I was a kid in the 1960s, a penneth of chips only cost 4d.

Got a right telling off back in the good old 1970's for paying 7 p at KFC instead of 5p at the chippy.

Ordered that £25 Baroque box, looks stonking value.

About 10 bags of chips.

[hafod]

The big Julian Bream 40 CD box ("The Complete RCA Album Collection") appears to be available on play.com for £11.99 as an mp3 320 kbps download.

Yes. I saw this (and a couple of others including the Gary Graffman Complete Album Collection for the same price), and agree it is a great deal. The problem is that it is listed as 'temporarily out of stock' and experience shows - as many on here have found out the hard way - that such 'bargain' items can remain in this state for a considerable period of time and then be listed as 'unobtainable'. This is particularly true of Amazon but it has happened on the play.com site. Still, probably worth monitoring these two for a while.

The van Cliburn Complete Album Collection as a download is also listed at £11.99 but that is in stock.

http://www.play.com/Music/MP3-Download-Album/4-/41478343/0/-/ListingDetails.html

PS. How can a download be out of stock? Is there some kind of 'master' that allows only a certain number of 'copies' to be made from it?

See #3681!!

[hafod]

Got a right telling off back in the good old 1970's for paying 7 p at KFC instead of 5p at the chippy.

It has clearly scarred you for life if you can recall the precise details after all these years!

[johnb]

PS. How can a download be out of stock? Is there some kind of 'master' that allows only a certain number of 'copies' to be made from it?

Yes, that is what I was puzzling over.

[Beef Oven!]

Got a right telling off back in the good old 1970's for paying 7 p at KFC instead of 5p at the chippy.

Ordered that £25 Baroque box, looks stonking value.

About 10 bags of chips.

Interesting though. With chips getting dearer and music getting ever-cheaper, for the price of 12/13 bags of chips, you get that Baroque box. In the 70s, using your example, how much music would you have got for 60/65p? A single 45?

[hafod]

#3677: These downloads may not be what they appear to be. The Julian Bream set (for example) is a 40 disc set but the Play.com site gives the total duration for the download as 08:51:34 i.e less than 14 minutes per disc!

http://www.play.com/Music/MP3-Download-Album/4-/51265802/0/-/ListingDetails.html

[cloughie]

Interesting though. With chips getting dearer and music getting ever-cheaper, for the price of 12/13 bags of chips, you get that Baroque box. In the 70s, using your example, how much music would you have got for 60/65p? A single 45?

Back in the mid 60s The Beatles 'Penny Lane' with its four of fish and finger pie cost 6s8d or 20x4d bags of chips (scraps optional).

[EdgeleyRob]

I mentioned this some time ago, but with regard to 'The All-Baroque Box' (50CD), this can be had for as little as £24.31 delivered:

http://www.play.com/Music/CD/4-/33414024/The-All-Baroque-Box/Product.html?searchstring=The+All+Baroque+Box+&searchsource=0&searchtype=musicall&urlrefer=search&strefer=musicall&searchfilters=s%7bThe+All+Baroque+Box+%7d%2bc%7b34%7d%2b

Full contents and performers:
http://www.mdt.co.uk/the-all-baroque...hiv-50cds.html

Thanks hafod.

[Stunsworth]

If you 'do downloads' this Decca set is something of a bargain...

http://www.qobuz.com/album/multi-interpretes-decca-sound-the-analogue-years-1954-1968/0002894786110

[HighlandDougie]

this Decca set is something of a bargain...

http://www.qobuz.com/album/multi-int.../0002894786110

It is - but it's just over half of the box (in physical form 50 CDs plus a 'bonus' of the Ansermet Glazunov etc in mono). If anyone is interested in this set (which has given me hours of pleasure, both in re-acquainting myself with some old favourites but also discovering some new gems), it's worth saving up for and buying the lot as a CD box. Excellent booklet with its history of the different approaches to microphone numbers and placement among different Decca producers and engineers.

[mathias broucek]

Cheap Messiaen mp3s here

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Olivier-Messiaen-1908-1992/dp/B00274JF80/ref=sr_1_1?s=dmusic&ie=UTF8&sr=1-1&keywords=messiaen+naive

Also Magnard

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Magnard-sym-1-Michel-Plasson/dp/B001KO68H4/ref=sr_1_1?s=dmusic&ie=UTF8&sr=1-1&keywords=magnard

[amateur51]

Half-price sale inc P&P at ICA Classics until 20 December 2013

http://icaclassics.com/christmas

This makes the 20 CD BBC Legends set now £27.50 inc P&P

Offer is not very clear - if you use code XMAS, then ALL their CDs/DVDs are 50% off during the sale period

[amateur51]

The Masterclass Media Foundation is running down its stock of Masterclass DVDs and is offering what remains at half-price. Members can view extracts if they are interested.

http://www.masterclassfoundation.org/

[johnb]

Rilling's complete Bach Cantatas (72 CDs) are on Amazon for £59.64. The catch is that all texts are on a CD Rom. It is certainly a bargain but the absence of a "real" booklet containing the texts will probably rule the box out for many people.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Complete-Cantatas-Special-Edition/dp/B004K583KA/ref=pd_sim_m_h__38

[Dave2002]

Rilling's complete Bach Cantatas (72 CDs) are on Amazon for £59.64. The catch is that all texts are on a CD Rom. It is certainly a bargain but the absence of a "real" booklet containing the texts will probably rule the box out for many people.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Complete...pd_sim_m_h__38

Is this a "must buy now" bargain with a significantly lower price than usual, or is it likely to stay around this price? Certainly for a reasonably complete set of the cantatas this seems good, and sampling the recordings via online streaming suggests that the recordings and performances are good.

The Brilliant Complete Bach set is available for about £81 - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Bach-Complet...=Complete+Bach but assuming the cantatas are the same performances as in previous Brilliant sets they mostly do not compare too well with some of the better performances and recordings available elsewhere - though there are some good things in the box.

Another complete Bach set is the one on Haenssler which contains Rilling's versions of the cantatas, but at nearly three times the price of the cantatas alone http://www.amazon.co.uk/Complete-Wor...=Complete+Bach (£165 approx currently).

I'm not sure how much of a problem not having the texts is with the Rilling cantata set, as the texts are surely quite widely available.

It is possible to pay a lot more for sets (some not fully complete) of Bach cantatas - such as Kuijken's CD/SACDs, which are done at a noticeably lower pitch, and generally have smaller forces. Kuijken's SACDs also have a surround sound layer, which may enhance the listening experience for anyone who has appropriate playback equipment.

There's also a limited edition of cantatas by JEG - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Bach-Cantata...+Bach+Gardiner (currently about £172) - though note the interpretation of the word "complete" here - it's not perhaps quite what you might expect.

I really like some other versions - such as the recently finished set by Suzuki - which is also available in surround sound SACD - and at a higher pitch (A=465) - but there is no sign of a likely price drop for any of those yet - so likely to cost at least ten times as much for all the cantatas. http://www.prestoclassical.co.uk/s/S...ach%2BCantatas

One question which can be asked about large box sets, in this case either fairly complete recordings of all Bach's works, or relevant to this post, the cantatas, is "how often will the CDs be taken out and played?" With Rilling's set there is at least a chance that some will make it to the CD player.

Amazon suggest a pairing of Rilling's set with a much earlier RIAS set by Ristenpart on 9 CDs, originally intended to be complete, but unfinished. Whether that has much to offer when modern recordings are taken into account I can't say - though a young DFD does feature. http://www.amazon.co.uk/RIAS-Bach-Ca...xgy_m_h__img_y

On balance the Rilling set is probably worth having at the price - I may be about to hit the "buy" button!