Search - Salvatore Accardo, Pierre Amoyal, Joshua Bell :: Violin Masterworks

Good Value

A. Roth | Baltimore, MD | 08/13/2009

(4 out of 5 stars)

"This arrived in the mail a few days ago. Since Amazon offers no tracklisting:

Bach: Violin Concertos, Sonatas and Solo Work

Barber and Bartok Concertos, Bloch Baal Shem

Beethoven - Concerto and Sonatas

Berg and Brahms Concerto and Sonatas

Dvorak and Elgar -- Concertos

Faure and Frank - Sonatas

Glazunov and Mendelssohn - Concertos

Mozart - Concertos, 15 Sonatas

Paganini - Concertis 1 and 4, Caprices

Prokofiev, Stravinsky and Tchaikovsky - Concertos

Ravel Tzigane and sonatas

Saint Saens - Concerto 1 & 3

Vivladi - 4 seasons



All are done by top performers. Kremer does the Bach violin concertos and Grumiaux the Bach sonatas, Beethoven sonatas and Mozart concerti.



All told, this is a great set and includes not only quality old timers, like Kremer, Szeryng, Accardo and Gruimiaux but also younger players like Bell and Josefowicz.



As with Decca sets, the packaging is poor. While the flip top box is attractive, the sleeves are thin paper and no track listings are on the disc. These sets are simply not made to rifle through, which I resent, because I think that makes it much easier. Still, for [...], which is what I paid for it used, I am delighted. Top quality repertoire at a great price. Give Decca credit, between this and the Dorati Haydn set, they are opening the vaults at great prices."

Wonderful "selection" set

L. Topper | 01/24/2010

(4 out of 5 stars)

"This is a set for a generalist. More rabid collectors would hold their nose up to a set like this. I have all of these works in multiple recordings by different artists, but this set is amazingly convenient to have by a computer or at a work station because there is so much to chose from---like the big boxes on Brilliant Classics.



The performances that I have heard so far have been excellent with superb musicians. The price is phenomenal. The cost per disc was pennies over $2.00 per disc including shipping. As little as one year ago, each of these 35 discs might have cost as much as $12.99 to $18.99 per disc new MSRP. Certainly, most could have been obtained for $7.00-12.00 discounted. That still represents a 60% to 75% savings.



The prior reviewer is correct across the board. The box is attractive and takes very little space considering the number of discs. Ten individual jewel boxes would take the same storage space on your book shelf.



What Decca should have done is follow the lead of Brilliant Classics or EMI these days and put in a DVD that listed all of the previous liner notes. A friend of mine explained that the cost of the booklets that we enjoy and are so used to reading constitute the costliest part of the production these compact disc sets. As customers, if we want discs as cheap as those prepared by Brilliant and sets like this or the EMI Icon boxes, we are going to have to get used to having very little documentation. Even Naxos is three times as expensive per disc than the discs in this set.



I still purchase classical and jazz discs at full price, and they come with documentation that increases the convenience of use, I pay from $10.00 to $!5.00 per disc. Putting all of this into perspective, I would prefer getting music at this price and read the occasional booklet in the other full-priced sets."