Richard Pennycuick writes:

>Apart from the obvious question of whether buying in bulk is necessarily a
>good thing, other than economically, you need to remember that the pendulum
>has swung somewhat even in the relatively short time since these sets were
>released.  IIRC, only the rarest works were recorded especially for the
>edition, and so the most recent of them are at least ten years old.

I bought Vol.8, Violin Concerti 422 508-2 because it contains a
performance of the spurious 271a (no. 6), which I happen to love to listen
to, still having it on Philips LP:  6882 006.  The Concerto no. 5 in A
K.219, another favorite, both musical selection and performance-wise is
both on this LP and in Vol. 8, all of its recordings, with the exception of
one of the four discs, are performed by Henryk Szeryng.  I enjoy Szeryng's
performances and would have bought this 4 disc set just for the concerti 5
& 6.  In addition the transfer to CD happens to be excellent and its audio
quality easily beats my LP, (and this particular LP happens to be *very*
good in itself).  It is my impression, from the several Complete Mozart
Edition boxes which I have, that both the performances and the transfer to
CD are outstanding!  Disc #4 in Volume 8 is all "DDD", not that I believe
it makes the sound any better, just that it can't be too "old".  (It also
happens that I was fortunate enough to attend some Szeryng performances in
New York's "Mostly Mozart" Festival.

"Norman M. Schwartz" <[log in to unmask]>