A trip to the record store, 41 years ago

[John Boyer]

I recently came across one of my own old Schwann catalogs. I thought I had long since discarded them, but I still had one from July 1983. (I had started collecting them beginning in 1979).  That we live in a golden age of recording is emphasized by what you could get in those days.

Do you like Raff? They were only three LPs available: Ponti's recording of the Piano Concerto, a competing one on the Genesis label, and Ruiz's recording of the Suite in D minor.  That was it, nothing else.  The Turnabout recording of the 3rd Symphony was out print by then.

Do you like Pfitzner? There was only one thing available, DG's recording of "Palestrina". Nothing else.

But even among mainstream composers there were many surprising gaps.  For Robert Schumann there are no recordings of the third violin sonata, and of the other two there are only three: Zeitlin on Vox, the Laredos on Desto, Gorevic, long time principal violist of my local symphony, on Crystal. 

What's interesting about these lonely three recordings is that not a one is on what were then the major labels of the day: RCA, Columbia/CBS, EMI/Angel, Decca/London, Phillips, and DG.  Schumann, in 1983 treated like Bruch: a few favorites and little else. 

And so it goes, composer after composer:the unsung composers we discuss here represented by one or two recordings or not at all, and even major composers represented by recordings of a limited number celebrated works, but the rest of their output ignored.

[Alan Howe]

Yes: we live in an age of extraordinary plenty. I suppose if you think about it, it would be like comparing 1983 with 1942! However bitterly we might complain about the non-availability of so much music in recordings, we have a great deal to be grateful for. As I type this I'm listening to Saint-Saëns' Déjanire. Who'd've thought it...? (Mind you, we had better singers 41 years ago, especially in the romantic repertoire.)

I used to enjoy my trips to the record shops in London. They always had something I hadn't heard of: I was like a kid in some huge sweet shop (sorry, John: candy store!)

[kolaboy]

I still have an old Schwann from 1981. I used it (at the time) to look up various pieces I'd not heard before to request on our local classical station. Likely drove them nuts at the time...

[Alan Howe]

I have most if not all of the old Penguin guides. I still flick through them and find recordings I'd missed or forgotten about. Happy days. Much more fun than scanning websites...

[Richard Moss]

I can't remember the details now correctly but in the 1960s I remember perusing the Classical Music Guide (or whatever it was called before it morphed into the enormous RED catalogue). The joy was not only seeing, at a glance, all the available recordings of a particular work, but the eye could take-in other/unknown works and composers in adjoining entries.  There was no need to spell out a composer's name to get the details.

Admittedly, as John & Alan say, the choice then was much smaller but I suspect that, given if I had a copy of the catalogue in my hands, I would find what I wanted as lot quicker than typing in the details online.  However, that meant a trip to the store to see the catalogue (until I started to buy it) so overall on-line probably was quicker (if less satisfying).  The explosion in entries over the last two or three decades is mind-blowing.  However, now when I peruse the PRESTO lists of the week's new releases, there seems to be fewer and fewer orchestral 'romantic-period' works being listed.  I hope this is NOT the end of our 'golden age' for unsungs.  que sera!

Richard

[John Boyer]

Now that I have it open again, I can see the Schumann entry goes on for pages, so Bob was not *that* neglected, but it still reveals some curiosities.  For example, the 2nd and 3rd piano trios could only be had in multi-disc sets, of which there were only two choices. 

One of the nice things about Schwann was that it gave the dates for the composers' lives, so it made scanning for composers from the Romantic period rather easy.  What sent me down that road was a chance encounter with Ponti's recording of the Rubinstein 4th.  I shared Alan's sense of excitement in discovery, especially when so much of the standard repertory was new to me, never mind the unsungs.  I can well remember encountering Dvorak's 8th or Berlioz's Fantastique for the first time. 

Thanks to the unsung composers, I was able extend the enthrallment of discovery long after I had mapped the known world of the standard repertory. 

[jasthill]

Ah! Nothing like a trip down memory lane to kindle the joys of record collecting.  I recall that in the record shop I frequented they would have the previous months Schwann catalog on the free table thus alleviating the need to spend the exuberant amount of I believe $ US 1.25 for the current month's catalog.  My oldest Gramophone is from August 1982  - Vaughan Williams The Sons of Light by Lyrita on the cover.  Don't forget by Penguin The Symphony by Ralph Hill. Of course I still have my Supraphon and Melodyia LP's - so hard to get back then - but the repertory - so intriguing - and the sleeve covers so artful - and the liner notes in 8 pt pica print. The one thing I wish existed is a photocopy(s) of the collection of the Records International Catalogs - my earliest October 1983.

[Maury]

Before 1990 or so the classical recordings were heavily weighted towards orchestral and solo piano music - chamber music not so much as it sold rather poorly. So that is why Schumann, Mendelssohn, even Schubert chamber music was spottily represented in the catalogs. They were really scarce in the US. Europe had a bit more but I didn't discover those until the 80s and 90s. The reverse has happened now as chamber works are cheaper to record and not many are eager to buy the usual orchestral suspects from latter day conductors when there is a plentiful supply from 1955 - 90.

While I appreciate the plethora of releases on CD I do feel sadly that the newer performances are often a bit generic or antiseptic. This particularly affects the unsungs and lesser sungs as there are not many older recordings as alternatives. I discovered Adriano about 30 years ago and think he has the older musicality but of course he had to deal with different orchestras of variable technical ability and motivation. I also have been impressed by the skill shown in some historical recording restorations.

It is gratifying that worthy "lost" music has at least some catalog now for those who want to listen to it.

[Ilja]

In a general sense, this thread strikes home for me professionally as well. I was trained as a historian in the early nineties. At that time, sources were a rare thing, something to treasure. Many historians, myself included, developed what might be called a "hamster mentality", just collecting everything you could because you didn't know whether you'd ever get the chance again – basically turning us into professional hoarders. 
Since then, a paradigmatic shift has come about because of the digital revolution. Instead of collectors we've become curators, selecting what we need from a vast forest of possibilities. Ironically, that comes with the same fear of overlooking that crucial bit of information that you really need. As a music collector, it still pains me to throw things away as much as it does as a historian.

[Mark Thomas]

I didn't bother with catalogues. Living only about an hour from central London in the early 70s, it was very easy to make the trip on a Saturday to a couple of stores in the Soho area which specialised in obscure LP labels and even more obscure music: IIRC one was called Harold Stave, long gone now of course.  Oh, the thrill of finding an LP of music by an unknown (to me) composer with the "right dates" (1800-1920 or so) or, even better, a new recording of music by someone who I'd already discovered and loved - Raff was the first such, but other early favourites were Glazunov (almost exclusively on those thick and heavy Melodiya discs) Rubinstein and Goetz. The Genesis, Louisville and Turnabout racks in particular were the first to be scoured for new releases. There was also a rather shifty Melodiya dealer who worked out of an unheated upstairs room opposite Foyles book shop on Charing Cross Road. Going to see him was always a rather grubby experience, but the joy of finding he had a previously unheard Glazunov symphony in stock made it worth while. Sometimes a major label would turn up trumps - Joan Sutherland and Richard Bonynge's thrilling Esclarmonde and Les Huguenots sets were my first exposure to opera (and remain favourites even now).

But nostalgia isn't what it used to be. It's easy to forget that many of those performances were cut, were of poor technical quality (Melodiya) or featured orchestras in particular which had clearly been selected for their cost rather than their quality (all those Turnabout recordings). Compared to many offerings now, the pickings then weren't only slim in number but also in quality. We have truly been living in a golden age for recordings of the unsung and, as Ilja points out, the digital age - with so many recordings both commercial and off-air freely available to listen to on YouTube - makes things almost too easy.

[Febct]

I always have lived within shouting distance of New York City - and, for eight years in the late-90s/early 2000s, in Manhattan itself.  My workplaces (this was long before Zoom!) all were in the City - from 1966 to 1997.

NYC had dozens of retailers - vinyl and cassettes, and then CDs.  There were at least three huge Tower Record stores, two HMVs, two Virgins, the well-known Record Hunter, Academy Music and others scattered amongst the neighborhoods.  I always would have in my pocket a want-list, compiled from reading the reviews in Gramophone, Fanfare, American Record Guide, et al.  And usually I'd walk out of these stores with shopping bags full.

When business would take me to other places - all across the USA and often Toronto (monthly), London and Munich (quarterly) - I would usually loiter for an extra day so to visit the local music outlets.

Today's "shopping" via the Internet is concise, fairly easy, and allows international access - but it's bloodless.  No more repartee with the store clerks, or with fellow customers.  No more idle browsing to unearth gems from the back burner - new repertoire or new composers. As with most aspects of our modern lives, I now purchase my CDs technologically - via a few keyboard strokes instead of plucking them, pristine-covered in cellophane, while delighting in the "find." 

[Alan Howe]

The one big plus today in comparison to the 'old days' is the near-certainty that CDs will play properly. In the days of vinyl, there was always the fear that purchases made away from home would turn out to feature poor pressings or - horror of horrors - SCRATCHES! DG releases were usually OK, but EMI were often terrible. I never did find a pristine set of Karajan's Tristan und Isolde.

[semloh]

In the 60s, I got many of my LPs from the Squires Gate Long-Playing Record Library (Blackpool, UK), founded by Penguin Record Guide faithful Ivan March in the 1950s. Later called the Squires Gate Music Centre, with branches across the UK, it was also the source of a host of catalogies and hard-to-find discographies. Yes, LP's arriving by post was fun!

[Febct]

What was the name of the record shop in London, in a small street just off Regent Street (perhaps near Liberty's?)? I think it carried the name of a person. I know of Schott - but I think there was another.  Memory fails.

[terry martyn]

Henry Stave?  Harold Moore's?