Bargains

[Mark Meldon]

Patience brings its Rewards

I got to page 70, with about seven or eight possibles saved off, before giving in. Then whittled them down to four.

Best Plan? Fire up the laptop or whatever, make a cup of tea, put on some nice music, and scroll away!

Last week, over Easter, "Fulfilment Express" were selling new classical CDs for 3p! Book enough and free postage. I picked up Rostropovich cello concertos 5CD box on EMI for 80p, Karajan's late Don Giovanni for £1.41, plus about 35 others, all for £30 or so. My postman is convinced I'm OCD!

Another great trick with Amzon is to use advanced search to select your favourite label. That's how I found Xiayin Wang's brilliant Rachmaninov Chandos CD for 11p delivered, the impressive set of Brahms symphonies from Daniel Raiskin and Staatsorchester Rheinische Philharmonie on 2Pianos Live for £2.01 and Chritian Blackshaw's first volume of Mozart Piano Sonatas on Wigmore Hall Live for, truthfully, 2p.

Happy hunting!

[Don Petter]

Don't give up too soon if taking the release date path. On page 100, for instance, I found:

http://www.oboeclassics.com/oboe+.htm

Not actually my scene, but a great bargain for those whose scene it is.

It almost seems embarrassing to see something with so much work, love and effort involved being offered for so little.

[Mark Meldon]

I agree, but the artists have (probably) already been paid and Zoverstocks, through their "Music Magpie" website hoover up a good proportion of the used CD stock, it seems. Recently, I have purchased CDs from them that can only have come from the likes of the long-gone Zavvi, failed independent stores, and, increasingly stock from France and Spain (you can tell by the price stickers!).

Why not give the creative process the respect it deserves by purchasing and listening?

[Don Petter]

I agree, but the artists have (probably) already been paid and Zoverstocks, through their "Music Magpie" website hoover up a good proportion of the used CD stock, it seems. Recently, I have purchased CDs from them that can only have come from the likes of the long-gone Zavvi, failed independent stores, and, increasingly stock from France and Spain (you can tell by the price stickers!).

Why not give the creative process the respect it deserves by purchasing and listening?

I might have done if I had got that far.

As mentioned, I have ordered a small basket of goodies, probably from equally worthy artists.

[hafod]

I have used the technique outlined by Mark M for a few years now. Yes, one gets the odd dud condition-wise, but at the price, who cares?
It is worth adding record label to the search criteria to avoid the dross pumped out by the majors.

Meanwhile, Cortot Anniversary Edition: 40 cds for £37.77. Too much Cortot for me - I shall be sticking with the 7 disc Icon box.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B008V1IR4Q/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pd_S_ttl?_encoding=UTF8&colid=3GXI8BUN316F2&coliid=I16WOOFTLY1LE8

[LeMartinPecheur]

Rico Saccini - WHO???

I've just taken my first trip through the 1p wonders and managed to escape unscathed - just as well as I bought far too much Falla at the weekend - see separate thread. [Possibly an unsuccessful attempt at fighting Falla with Falla (sorry, OT!).]

A question: does anyone know who conductor Rico Saccani is? Yes, I know I can Google but how come he has loads of discs all in the same series judging by the sleeve style, and all with different photos of his handsome clock? Is this some form of vanity-publishing ego trip for a mega-millionaire, or is he a mega-celebrity or sex bomb in Italy?

Has anyone actually checked out his conducting skills at 1p (+ £1.26 p&p)? Or possibly via Selections Dorchester, 99p + £2.35 p&p per order, so cheaper if you want a really big load of his admittedly quiet varied repertoire!

EDIT His name is Saccani as above, not as per title. Sorry Mr Saccani, sir. Google does show him apparently as a real Italian-American conductor c60 years of age with a decent career mainly in Hungary, but I'm still baffled by all those cheapo discs kicking around.

[Dave2002]

I had several of those recordings by Saccani from Selections. According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rico_Saccani he has done a lot of work in Hungary. I had a friend who strongly recommended taking trips to Budapest to see opera, and possibly Saccani featured. We are probably spoilt for choice these days. The CDs I've heard are perfectly reasonable, but not particularly special. Quite often the best or outstanding is the enemy of the good or merely OK. We may have got used to hearing very good performances of such a lot of music in the last few decades.

In the meantime I have noted that in recent years a lot of opera recordings are now available cheaply. When I started collecting, opera recordings were way outside my budget, and seemed a specialised and expensive area. I spotted this one recently - http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/offer-lis...&condition=new Mozart Magic Flute conducted by Sawallisch for £6 - a decent recording with a lot of the spoken dialogue.

Earlier I had Muti's Don Giovanni - http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/offer-lis...&condition=new which can be even cheaper via the Marketplace - though I noticed that I bought directly from amazon on that occasion, and presumably had the benefit of AutoRip.

[hafod]

In the meantime I have noted that in recent years a lot of opera recordings are now available cheaply. When I started collecting, opera recordings were way outside my budget, and seemed a specialised and expensive area. I spotted this one recently - http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/offer-lis...&condition=new Mozart Magic Flute conducted by Sawallisch for £6 - a decent recording with a lot of the spoken dialogue.

Earlier I had Muti's Don Giovanni - http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/offer-lis...&condition=new which can be even cheaper via the Marketplace - though I noticed that I bought directly from amazon on that occasion, and presumably had the benefit of AutoRip.

I agree - a number of opera sets can be had very cheaply via the Marketplace. A couple I found - both on Philips Duo (and still available) - are La Boheme/Colin Davis and Rigoletto/Sinopoli for 25p each. There is also an Il Trovatore/Davis on Philips for 1p and Don Carlo/Karajan on EMI also 1p. I have just bought the Bohm/Fidelio on DG for 1p.......

[Roehre]

Right!

Search "Classical" but leave the box blank. That will bring up hundreds of thousands of discs!

Than scroll down on left-hand side and enter 0.01 -0.01 in the price box then click go.

That will bring up 400 pages of CDs.

Then in drop-down box towards top of right-hand side click on, if you like, "release date" and presto!

You will have a list of tempting purchases.

Or you can search by composer.

I'm ashamed to say that I'm stocking up for the winter season already with 40+ bought today!

Good luck.

Is every CD which one wishes to buy charged with 1.26 p&p, effectively making the price £1.27 ?

[Dave2002]

Is every CD which one wishes to buy charged with 1.26 p&p, effectively making the price £1.27 ?

I think so, but that may still be quite a good deal - depending on what is on offer. The Christopher Redgate oboe CD Bryn pointed out could be a case in point.

[hafod]

Is every CD which one wishes to buy charged with 1.26 p&p, effectively making the price £1.27 ?

Yes - the lower end for charity shop prices

[hafod]

John Eliot Gardiner - Bach Cantatas: Complete Box Set, 56 discs for £114.77.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00ETHPJ1U/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pd_nS_img?_encoding=UTF8&colid=LQHDDV9CIDRU&coliid=ITOYQHX3U039V

[Petrushka]

Eugen Jochum Symphonies set (Beethoven, Brahms and Bruckner) divided between BPO and BRSO. 16 discs for £21.72.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Symphonies-Eugen-Jochum/dp/B00IK5I0TU/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1399238137&sr=1-1&keywords=jochum

[Lion-of-Vienna]

Eugen Jochum Symphonies set (Beethoven, Brahms and Bruckner) divided between BPO and BRSO. 16 discs for £21.72.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Symphonies-E...eywords=jochum

....or if you prefer to obtain it from Republic of Korea it's just £326 used (+ delivery).

[Dave2002]

Is every CD which one wishes to buy charged with 1.26 p&p, effectively making the price £1.27 ?

Not a big deal, since I just bought around a tenner's worth, but all of the 1p CDs I bought from zoverstocks recently for £1.27 are clearly used, though some are in very good condition. That's as they were described.

I sometimes get cheaper deals and more interesting music in charity shops, but it depends on the shop, and how much rummaging around one has to do.
I have had what look like new items sold as used before now from some suppliers, such as marvello - but at a nominal price of 1p a shot for items which might be of interest the on line sales of used items aren't bad. I probably wouldn't buy used items of more regular repertoire. Sometimes there is no choice but to buy a used item - as the originals may not be available any more.