Why own multiple performances of the same work?

[Petrushka]

Most replies up to this point have been from those with either modest CD collections or streamers. Here's one from a true obsessive!

I have a very large CD collection and very many works endlessly duplicated, in some cases 50 or more versions of the same work. But get this: all of them are different!

There are innumerable variables involved in recordings from the obvious eg sound, conductor and orchestra to the much less obvious eg the time of year, the date of recording or the weather on the day. Consider for example, Furtwångler's 1944 VPO Eroica. It is an entirely different listening experience to any other Eroica in the vast catalogue of recordings of the work and each of those in their turn are different from all the others. Now try the same procedure with other works of your choice. When you do, the differences become immediately apparent and more become apparent over time. There's a YouTube video of, I think, 42 different versions of just the first two opening chords of the Eroica. The differences between them are amazing heard in such close proximity.

This is what makes collecting so many versions of the same work so endlessly fascinating even if it does border on OCD at times.

[oliver sudden]

Download the music you want to hear on the app and then listen on the move? All you need is a pair of bluetooth headphones (some of which are spectacularly good - thinking of the new B&W pi8) or via usb cable to your playback device.

I _could_ do that, I suppose. But if I’m going to download something I’d rather keep the file on a hard drive than depend on the app of a streaming service, especially since streaming doesn’t attract me anyway for various other reasons…

[Barbirollians]

Not sure headphones when driving is a good idea .

[Roger Webb]

Download the music you want to hear on the app and then listen on the move? All you need is a pair of bluetooth headphones (some of which are spectacularly good - thinking of the new B&W pi8) or via usb cable to your playback device.

This is what I do when going on holiday where there is no internet - National Trust/English Heritage etc. Download from Qobuz onto my tablet then bluetooth to the car radio on the way there, and plug in an OTG DAC that feeds the little self-powered monitor speakers made by Quad Electroacoustics for studio use that I take with me...some people think it's odd to take speaker stands too, but I can never find good places to position them otherwise!

[oliver sudden]

Not sure headphones when driving is a good idea .

Me driving with headphones is not a significantly worse idea than me driving without headphones!

[oliver sudden]

This is what I do when going on holiday where there is no internet - National Trust/English Heritage etc. Download from Qobuz onto my tablet then bluetooth to the car radio on the way there, and plug in an OTG DAC that feeds the little self-powered monitor speakers made by Quad Electroacoustics for studio use that I take with me...some people think it's odd to take speaker stands too, but I can never find good places to position them otherwise!

This is of course a perfectly excellent idea but it isn’t really streaming, is it?

[LMcD]

I probably have that difficulty too, and giving CDs away is hard, as few people want the type of music I like. However I do offload a few that way.

For some people, maybe. The Oxfam shop in Woodbridge sells loads. My only major duplicates are symphonies by Sibelius (5th), Vaughan Williams (2nd) and Elgar (1st).

[smittims]

Many years ago the Record Guide said 'one of the pleasures of record colleting is the ability to compare different interpretations of the same work'. I thought that the understatement of the century, It was of course made at a time when there were just starting to be mulitple available versions even of popular works.

My father, a veteran of the days when there was usually only one available recoroding of a work, and many works unrecorded , could never understand why I wanted more than one version, and to have, say, nine Furtwangler Ninths would seem lunacy to him. I remember his calculating with a pencil on the back of an old envelope (as was his wont) the ideal number of Cds anyone should need. It was 82 I think, based on the amunt of time oen spent listening, and the frequency with which one shoud (in his opinion of course!) be willing to hear a favourite record.*

To those who kept asking me 'haven't you got enough?' I always said 'It's not about quanitiy, but quality; the ability to listen to any recording whenever I want'.

Of course streaming has done this now, and I guess many younger people, living in the tiny , energy-efficient hoiuses being built nowadays, have no CDs nor books nor DVDs. but stream and e-book everything. However, there is still a hankering after owning the tangible object, hence the revival in 'vinyl'.


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* this could be another thread of course: 'how often do you listen to a favourite work?' I love The Dream of Gerontius dearly, but I rarely listen to it more than once in two years. I like variety in my listening.

[kernelbogey]

Many thanks to everyone who has posted. I should have said that I don't yet stream; also that I have many many cassette tapes (somewhere!) downloaded from a certain station mostly in the '70s ad '80s.

I look forward to more posts.

(Whatever happened to 'King Christian [the Umpteenth]' who owned c140 versions of Sibelius 2?

[Roger Webb]

This is of course a perfectly excellent idea but it isn’t really streaming, is it?

Er, well it is in a way, in that you are streaming the albums to your device and merely storing them so that they can be played at any time you haven't an internet connection. People often do this when on a mobile network so as to save on their contract bitrate allowance, but when they get home on wifi they play streamed content in the normal way.

One thing that's always puzzled me about 'download offline listening' is, how does Qobuz know how many times you've played a particular 'track' so the track owner/artist can be payed.

[Petrushka]

There is another aspect to classical record collecting that I forgot to mention in my earlier post. This is the 'Holy Grail' aspect. The belief that, finally, finally, the 50th version of a particular work will be The Perfect One! Of course, it never is, and so the search continues.

Another part of the same thing is deliberately collecting the entire recorded legacy of, either, a particular work or an admired artist. I tend to do both of these. For example, I must have close to every recording ever made of the Beethoven 9th. In addition, I must surely have virtually every recording Karajan ever made, though still the odd EMI operas are missing. Now, there are live recordings appearing to make the quest a never ending one!

[LMcD]

I have many many cassette tapes .....downloaded from a certain station mostly in the '70s ad '80s.

As have I, and I've just bought a brand new gpo cassette player (still in its original box) from a charity shop for the princely sum of £7.

[oliver sudden]

One thing that's always puzzled me about 'download offline listening' is, how does Qobuz know how many times you've played a particular 'track' so the track owner/artist can be payed.

I think if my ancient iPod can remember how many times I’ve played something, your Qobuz app can too!

(And I’m sure fairly remunerating the artists is uppermost in their minds at all times…)

[french frank]

Another part of the same thing is deliberately collecting the entire recorded legacy of, either, a particular work or an admired artist. I tend to do both of these. For example, I must have close to every recording ever made of the Beethoven 9th. In addition, I must surely have virtually every recording Karajan ever made, though still the odd EMI operas are missing. Now, there are live recordings appearing to make the quest a never ending one!

So I wonder what percentage of the satisfaction is about just owning them as distinct from listening to them? With books I have a number which I've never read but they are available to be read if some unpredictable cue arises (e.g.my brother mentioned Solzhenitsyn's Cancer Ward this morning, which I have); but my book collection is nowhere near as big as some people's record collection. (And my record collection is mere.)

[cloughie]

Yes I have many versions of many works and have had much enjoyment from the collection over the years but now some gradual thinning is taking place. Storage space is full and at my age and stage of life many cds will be likely not played again. The beneficiaries will be the charity shops which accept them with a gift aid bonus. I’ve only a limited interest in streaming as I am happy with my ageing collection and hifi equipment and no real desire to update or connect to computer though I do the occasional download to cd or sync to memory stick to play in car ( no cd player there!)