Anupam Basu wrote:

>Well, I am just twenty and not even love-sick and he's got me too!!  So
>could someone please recommend a complete Mahler cycle - or is it better
>to buy them individually.  And yes, price IS a factor, what with the rupee
>being down under against the doller:-(.

Build your own.  I don't think any conductor of Mahler's music (and I
include all the greatest) has ever conducted all the symphonies equally
well.  They all have their blind spots.  Here are my current favourites,
many of which are at medium or bargain price.  You don't have to spend a
fortune for great Mahler recordings, sometimes quite the opposite is the
case.

No.1: My own favourites are Kubelik (DG), Horenstein (Unicorn) and
Horenstein (Vox, coupled with a fine Bruckner 9th) and Walter (Sony).
There is also a live Kubelik recording from 1972 on Originals (not to
be confused with DG Originals) that is superb but very hard to find.

No.2: Klemperer (both the EMI 1962 studio version and the live Amsterdam
recording from 1951), Scherchen (Millennium), Kubelik (DG), Walter (Sony),
Boulez (Originals) and Barbirolli (Arkadia).

No.3: Horenstein (Unicorn), Adler (Harmonia Mundi), Kubelik (DG),
Barbirolli (BBC Legends).

No.4: Horenstein (Chief, Seraphim), Kletzki (Royal), Mengelberg, Szell
(Sony).

No.5: Barbirolli (EMI), Boulez (DG), Scherchen (Millennium), Shipway
(Tring), Inoue (ASV) Mackerras (EMI).  There is also Walter and the NYPO
in mono from 1947 on Sony.

No.6: Boulez (DG), Nanut (Zyx and others), Horenstein (Unicorn, Music
and Arts), Barbirolli (EMI) and Thomas Sanderling (RS), Szell (Sony.)

No.7: Horenstein (Descant, Music and Arts), Scherchen (Millennium),
Scherchen (Music and Arts),Rattle (EMI).

No.8: Horenstein (BBC Legends).  No other will do for me now.  No other
comes close.

No.9: Horenstein LSO 1966 (Music and Arts), Klemperer (EMI), Walter (both
the Sony 1961 and the Vienna 1938 live recording on Dutton) and Barbirolli
(EMI).

No.10: Wigglesworth on a BBC magazine disc.

Das Lied Von Der Erde: Walter (both the Decca 1952 and the live 1936 on
Dutton and other labels), Horenstein (Descant, Music and Arts), Klemperer
on EMI.

As you see, not a Bernstein in sight.

Tony Duggan
Staffordshire,
United Kingdom.