My first three classical CD's

[richardfinegold]

2 CDs were included with the purchase of my first CD Player. Since I couldn't afford to buy any more for months, I remember them well.
Colin Davis/Boston SO Debussy Orchestral Works
Youri Egorov Schumann Piano Works

I think my 3rd CD was Pollini in Chopin's Preludes

[LeMartinPecheur]

First CD was early 90s, Decca RCO/ Ashkenazy Rachmaninov The Bells/ 3 Russian Folk Songs cos it was cheap and I was beginning to realise I'd have to buy a CD player sometime soon. Can't recall what I bought next It's still on my shelves.

First cassette was a non-Dolby EMI double play of the Barbirolli Mahler 5, c1973. Didn't own a cassette player then but knew etc etc. Not still on my shelves - I quickly invested in the LPs for decent sound. May yet get the CD

First LP was mono Saga, ERO 8009, The Magic of the Violin, Hugh Bean/ David Parkhouse, IIRC 25p in a W H Smith sale (remember when they had real classical bargains??) Did already have a box that played LPs...after a fashion. Even if it ate stereos for breakfast some monos survived and this one is still on the shelves. Must try it again on the Linn Sondek with once-state-of-art moving coil cartridge

For completeness I have a small pile of BluRay opera discs from a particular charity shop. Hoping soon to get a BluRay player

Hopefully before they stop making them...

[jayne lee wilson]

Yes, I do remember this very well, as I came late to CD, only getting my first player - an Arcam Alpha 8 (I tried the 7 but wasn't happy with it and stumped up for a smoother ride...) in July 1998.

The christening involved:
(No kidding, honest!)

Bruckner Symphony No.2 (1872 ed.Carragan) NSO Ireland/Georg Tintner. Naxos.
Holst Orchestral Works (Beni Mora, Somerset Rhapsody etc.) RSNO/Lloyd-Jones. Naxos.

a little later...
Holmboe Four Symphonic Metamorphoses. Aalborg SO/O.A.Hughes. BIS.
Reich The Desert Music. Brooklyn PO, etc. /MTT. Nonesuch.

Due to financial constraints I'd simply taped Radio 3 concerts off-air for many years, so when I got the Arcam my impulse was usually to pick out a few new releases from the Gramophone each month and try to avoid the obvious...

[Bryn]

I can't remember what my second and third CDs were but the first was Beethoven's 9th (LCP/Norrington). This was before I even had a CD player. I already had the LP version.

[Nick Armstrong]

I remember only the first two ....

I bought them before getting my first CD player - rather ridiculously, I remember just gazing and marvelling at those strange silver discs for a few weeks beforehand!

I remember only the first one, like Bryn - and likewise, bought (like my first 30 or so I think) before I owned a CD player. A few years before, in fact... but I had lodgings (I wor nobbut a young lawyer in them days) in a house which had a CD Player linked up to a tape deck, and I was allowed to put the CDs on tape so I could play them on my student portable Hitachi radio-cassette player...

The CD? Richard Strauss orchestral music from the operas:



(Very early, I preferred operatic music without the singers, I realise! )

[Bryn]

I remember only the first one, like Bryn - and likewise, bought (like my first 30 or so I think) before I owned a CD player. A few years before, in fact... but I had lodgings (I wor nobbut a young lawyer in them days) in a house which had a CD Player linked up to a tape deck, and I was allowed to put the CDs on tape so I could play them on my student portable Hitachi radio-cassette player...

I too had access to a CD player, that belonging to a near neighbour, two doors away.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Ravel: Daphnis & Chloe (Montreal/Dutoit) - superb - I bought it on 1/03/83 and I still have it
Rodrigo: Concierto di Aranjuez, etc. (Bonell/Montreal/Dutoit) - still have it
Franck: Symphony in D minor (Bernstein) - appalling sound - given to worst enemy.

[Serial_Apologist]

Like others, I got my first CDs before having a CD player. I think they were probably presents, prompting me to get the equipment, but, again like others, I can't recall what the recordings were. I guess, having by then (around 1989) acquired a sizeable vinyl collection diminished the excitement of obtaining recordings thereafter.

[cloughie]

I remember only the first one, like Bryn - and likewise, bought (like my first 30 or so I think) before I owned a CD player. A few years before, in fact... but I had lodgings (I wor nobbut a young lawyer in them days) in a house which had a CD Player linked up to a tape deck, and I was allowed to put the CDs on tape so I could play them on my student portable Hitachi radio-cassette player...

The CD? Richard Strauss orchestral music from the operas:



(Very early, I preferred operatic music without the singers, I realise! )

Those voices don't half get in the way of the music!

[EdgeleyRob]

Can't remember,but the complete Beethoven Symphony set (which I no longer have)from Britannia music club was early acquisition IIRC

[cloughie]

I bought my first CD player in November 1985 and on that very afternoon went off to purchase £100 worth of CDs. Bearing in mind that full price CDs were £14.99 at that time I didn't get as much as I'd hoped. However, interesting to see some are the same as other forumites.

Holst: The Planets LPO/Solti
Mahler: Symphony No 2 Chicago SO/Solti
Tchaikovsky: Symphony No 4 Chicago SO/Solti
Ravel: Daphnis and Chloe Montreal SO/Dutoit

I think I also got:
Shostakovich: Symphony No 5 Concertgebouw/Haitink
Bruckner: Symphony No 8 Concertgebouw/Haitink

If didn't get the last two on that occasion then they were very early purchases. I still have them all.

Incidentally, I've never played an LP since that day!

Indeed interesting common purchases of the Tchaikovsky and Ravel. I think for me the lure of CDs was that after all those years of however caring for LPs the quiet starts of works like Daphnis and Firebird, and the third movement of Tchaikovsky 4 would really be totally crackle-free.

[rauschwerk]

It was 1985 and I had just bought a used Philips CD100 off a work colleague. Two of my first discs were definitely the Pinnock Brandenburgs, replacing the Baumgatner set (Archiv) which had served me well for 20 years. I think the third was probably Respighi's Roman trilogy (Dutoit), and I well remember being thrilled with the sound, though what I would think of it now on that player and my Rogers amplifier, goodness only knows.

[Alison]

Elgar: Overtures SNO/Gibson

Bruckner: Symphony 9 Concertgebouw/Haitink

Haydn: Piano Sonatas Brendel

[cloughie]

It was 1985 and I had just bought a used Philips CD100 off a work colleague. Two of my first discs were definitely the Pinnock Brandenburgs, replacing the Baumgatner set (Archiv) which had served me well for 20 years. I think the third was probably Respighi's Roman trilogy (Dutoit), and I well remember being thrilled with the sound, though what I would think of it now on that player and my Rogers amplifier, goodness only knows.

Why? What would you play it on now?

[Richard Tarleton]

Like others, I got my first CDs before having a CD player.

Me too. My first were the Jochum set of Die Meistersinger, Joan Sutherland's The Art of the Prima Donna and, for reasons which now escape me, Poulenc piano music by Pascal Rogé.