Bill Karzas replied:
>Richard Todd wrote:
>
>>There used to be contributor to this list, whose Polish-sounding name I
>>can't remember, who was an editor of a French publication very similar to
>>the Penguin Guide. ...
>
>He is Piotr Kaminski, who co-authored with Jean-Charles Hoffele the "Guide
>des Indispensables du disque compact classique." ...
>
>I don't know if they are still bringing out up-to-date versions.
I forwarded Bill's note to Piotr Kaminski who replied with the following
note to the list:
Hello, happy MCML members, hello Bill! It's nice to hear we're still
gratefully remembered after so many years. Les Indispensables have
slowed down; there have been no further installments in the series
since the 1997 "Bargain" edition, and the reasons for it are twofold:
1. The market has collapsed, as all of you know. The life-span of
a CD is now (at least in France) of about one to six months; sometimes,
the moment you read a review of a recording in a monthly magazine
(Diapason, Le Monde de la Musique etc), it means that you won't be
able to find it anymore. Since we have based our work on the principle
of availability, which was still valid five years ago, we should now
publish follow-ups every three months or so, and provide a day-to-day
detective work on what is, and what isn't there - the record companies
refusing systematically to reveal any credible list of suppressed
CDs. This is simply impossible, neither to us (there is only two of
us, period), nor to our publisher. It doesn't mean Les Indispensables
is dead - since we are still alive, listening, thinking, writing.
The concept is being currently redesigned, and I leave to your
imagination what it might become.
2. After four years of crazy work, the authors noticed Les
Indispensables have killed all their other activities. They had to
catch up with it. PK is currently writing a book which is +/- two
years late, and JCH is the spiritus movens behind the Dante/Lys
production, which is there for all to see.
Many hours of happy listening
Piotr Kaminski
Tim Dickinson
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http://www.tdware.com/
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