|
time_is_now
|
 |
« Reply #45 on: 23:43:05, 15-05-2007 » |
|
I once heard someone scornfully refer to it in MDC Ah, you're one of my old customers, then?  (Just to clarify: it wasn't me who made the comment! Must have been one of my esteemed colleagues ...) |
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
The city is a process which always veers away from the form envisaged and desired, ... whose revenge upon its architects and planners undoes every dream of mastery. It is [also] one of the sites where Dasein is assigned the impossible task of putting right what can never be put right. - Rob Lapsley
|
|
|
|
Parsifal1882
|
|
« Reply #46 on: 04:38:30, 16-05-2007 » |
|
Morning, SK!
I can't say the Callas PARSIFAL is perfect, but it's definitely worth acquiring (you can get it on many import labels for as low as 8 or 9 pounds). The score is cut, the sound is just OK for 1950, the title role is sung indifferently by an obscure tenor, but the Act 2 duet with Kundry is thrilling, so are the scenes with Gurnemanz (Christoff), Amfortas (Panerai), and Klingsor (Modesti). Will report back on MEISTERSINGER.
|
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
Il duolo della terra nel chiostro ancor ci segue, solo del cor la guerra in ciel si calmera! E la voce di Carlo! E Carlo Quinto! Mio padre! O ciel!
|
|
|
|
Reiner Torheit
|
|
« Reply #47 on: 07:38:17, 16-05-2007 » |
|
Aha, I do know the Callas PARSIFAL, and I agree here with Parsifal1882... definitely worth hearing :-) It is a long, long way from Bayreuth "Urtext" recordings, of course, but its whole charm lies in that. I like to hope that true Wagner fans would support his work being heard near and far, and in versions that audiences in those near & far places would have found accessible at the time. (Let's remember that the first "production" of PARSIFAL in Britain - if one can call it that - was a 45-minute performance at the London Coliseum (when it was still a Variety Theatre, long before the days of ENO), consisting of a suite of orchestral highlights, which were acted-out in mime on the stage by Oswald Stoll's Musical-Hall Artistes.... nothing was sung at all. The whole thing was part of the evening's full bill of music-hall acts. There are some who'd say this was an improvement ) |
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
"I was, for several months, mutely in love with a coloratura soprano, who seemed to me to have wafted straight from Paradise to the stage of the Odessa Opera-House"
- Leon Trotsky, "My Life"
|
|
|
|
Parsifal1882
|
|
« Reply #48 on: 11:53:16, 16-05-2007 » |
|
Re Callas & MDC: I got my Callas PARSIFAL (Cetra) from MDC many years back! Pity they've ceased their excellent mail-order service (anyone know why?): though advertising new stock, their site isn't useful to me, not residing in the UK.
There have been rumours of the survival of Callas's TRISTAN: I only wish it may resurface soon (or her WALKURE!), having heard her two recordings of the LIEBESTOD in Italian (studio and live). So, I DO care about Callas singing Wagner in ANY language!
|
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
Il duolo della terra nel chiostro ancor ci segue, solo del cor la guerra in ciel si calmera! E la voce di Carlo! E Carlo Quinto! Mio padre! O ciel!
|
|
|
|
Reiner Torheit
|
|
« Reply #49 on: 12:01:03, 16-05-2007 » |
|
I remember the days when MDC was "Ron's Music", at the old Baker Street shop I think I spent most of my student grant in there As infamously mentioned before, I support opera performed in translation, so that audiences understand what the hell is going on - so TRISTAN in Italian is no problem for me |
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
"I was, for several months, mutely in love with a coloratura soprano, who seemed to me to have wafted straight from Paradise to the stage of the Odessa Opera-House"
- Leon Trotsky, "My Life"
|
|
|
|
time_is_now
|
|
« Reply #50 on: 13:21:56, 16-05-2007 » |
|
Haha. I didn't know 'Ron' but he'd been manager at the South Kensington branch a few years before I arrived there as assistant manager.
I was then at the Strand until that branch amalgamated with the big new shop on the South Bank. The mail order operation closed down 4 or 5 years ago now, for the normal reasons, Parsifal - too little custom and too-high overheads in the face of competition from online retailers with much lower running costs (no shop space to maintain, less specialist staff knowledge, etc.). It is a pity, as they used to offer some quite rare items, but I think there simply wasn't enough demand.
|
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
The city is a process which always veers away from the form envisaged and desired, ... whose revenge upon its architects and planners undoes every dream of mastery. It is [also] one of the sites where Dasein is assigned the impossible task of putting right what can never be put right. - Rob Lapsley
|
|
|
|
Swan_Knight
|
|
« Reply #51 on: 17:09:13, 16-05-2007 » |
|
It's a great shame the way MDC has contracted in recent years. When I moved to London in 1998, it had four shops that I was aware of: by the time I left in 2002, it was down to 2, at which figure it remains. It remains a great shop for rarities and other items. And quite a lot of my collection comes from their sales in the late 90s/early 00s. My favourite MDC memory is of engaging in a bit of banter with one of the female sales assistants, who got the impression I was trying to 'pull' her (much to her horror!) I wasn't, btw.  |
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
...so flatterten lachend die Locken....
|
|
|
|
time_is_now
|
|
« Reply #52 on: 17:36:50, 16-05-2007 » |
|
It's a great shame the way MDC has contracted in recent years. When I moved to London in 1998, it had four shops that I was aware of: by the time I left in 2002, it was down to 2, at which figure it remains. Which ones were you aware of, SK? I only started working for MDC in October 2002, at which point there were 4 branches - the Strand, St Martin's Lane, the boutique inside the Festival Hall, and South Kensington. (It's true, there had been 6 or 7 until just a few years earlier.) They then took over the shop inside the Barbican Centre, which took them back up to 5, but that closed about a year later, as did South Kensington. But there were still 3 shops until the Strand closed in July 2005 (which is when I left the company). Anyway, I'm off-topic.  |
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
The city is a process which always veers away from the form envisaged and desired, ... whose revenge upon its architects and planners undoes every dream of mastery. It is [also] one of the sites where Dasein is assigned the impossible task of putting right what can never be put right. - Rob Lapsley
|
|
|
|
oliver sudden
|
|
« Reply #53 on: 17:58:18, 16-05-2007 » |
|
TRISTAN in Italian is no problem for me Would you support translating it into German then?  |
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
|
|
|
|
Swan_Knight
|
|
« Reply #54 on: 18:41:20, 16-05-2007 » |
|
T_i_n.....there was the Strand Shop, the Colliseum shop, the shop just off Oxford Street and the one in South Ken. Always thought that the RFH shop was Farringdons and therefore separate. And tended not to classify the Barbican shop as an MDC.
|
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
...so flatterten lachend die Locken....
|
|
|
|
ernani
|
|
« Reply #55 on: 21:26:26, 16-05-2007 » |
|
Not living even close to London, I used to look forward to visiting the MDC on the Strand in particular and picked up some great stuff there over the years. I'm really sad that it's no longer there, but thank goodness for the Coli branch. I also used to like Tower on Piccadilly, and the HMV on Oxford Street is pretty good. When you live in a town like me with the usual bog standard HMV/Virgin combo and nothing else, London's CD shops are not to be sniffed at. Thank goodness too for Paris with the FNACs and fantastic little independent stores (there's a particularly good one on a little side street just behind the Sorbonne that I found last year, where I got some great rare live Wagner, Strauss and Puccini recordings) |
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
|
|
|
|
oliver sudden
|
|
« Reply #56 on: 21:43:23, 16-05-2007 » |
|
Is there already a Favourite Record Shop thread? (Record in the broad sense of 'recorded music' of course.) If not there should be.
|
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
|
|
|
|
Reiner Torheit
|
|
« Reply #57 on: 22:00:36, 16-05-2007 » |
|
Would you support translating it into German then? Why not? We could have a Berliner do the translation :-) Na wat denn? Was is das fur'ne Oper denn? |
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
"I was, for several months, mutely in love with a coloratura soprano, who seemed to me to have wafted straight from Paradise to the stage of the Odessa Opera-House"
- Leon Trotsky, "My Life"
|
|
|
|
oliver sudden
|
|
« Reply #58 on: 22:17:10, 16-05-2007 » |
|
Or a Kölner perhaps. Where Isolde says "Drinkste eine met?" and a bit later King Mark shrugs his shoulders with a cry of "Wat fott es, es fott... wat wellste maache?" Or a Bavarian Isolde. "Mild und leise, gell? Wie er lächelt, gell?" |
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
|
|
|
|
Reiner Torheit
|
|
« Reply #59 on: 22:46:30, 16-05-2007 » |
|
As I don't have a home address in Britain and get around when I'm there, can I nominate "The Classical Long-Player" in Brighton as a super example of a great shop selling recorded music?
|
|
|
|
|
Logged
|
"I was, for several months, mutely in love with a coloratura soprano, who seemed to me to have wafted straight from Paradise to the stage of the Odessa Opera-House"
- Leon Trotsky, "My Life"
|
|
|
|
