Complete Beethoven Edition for FIFTY EURO!!!

[Michael]

The set of 87 CD's costs under fifty euro. Shipping to Europe is eight euro. Total would be about forty pounds sterling!
Much of this edition seems to be sourced from the very respectable Naxos catalogue. This would plug all the gaps in anyone's collection.

Check here:

http://www.mail-order-kaiser.de/appE...NUM_DAO=635597

(You can find out all about this edition in another thread with a similar title. For some reason I can't duplicate the link here.)

[Michael]

Just thought I'd bump this, to see if anybody has any reaction or interest???
The same set is going on eBay for three times the price.
I would like to add that I am not getting a cut on any sales and have no connection with any of the sellers!
It all comes from an earnest desire to spead a little happiness among Beethovenians.

[JA Gardiner]

I keep trying to reply to this but the system doesn't seem to like me at present. Let's see if it works this way. I've leapt at the chance to buy this set and can't wait for it to arrive. I also have the Brilliant Mozart set and smaller boxes from their Bach and Beethoven collections of which more if this works! Bless you Michael for pointing it out

[Michael]

I keep trying to reply to this but the system doesn't seem to like me at present. Let's see if it works this way. I've leapt at the chance to buy this set and can't wait for it to arrive. I also have the Brilliant Mozart set and smaller boxes from their Bach and Beethoven collections of which more if this works! Bless you Michael for pointing it out

Ah, success at last!

[JA Gardiner]

Ok so let's try again. I find my Complete Mozart ( comprising 170 CD's) - which I bought for the ridiculous price of £49 last year extremely useful for rangefinding - discovering pieces I like and want then to buy the best recordings of , and introducing me to pieces I would otherwise have missed or minor/less well known works that rarely make it onto major label discs. It may not be the Philips Complete Edition - but I don't have £1000 to spend on that or the DGG Beethoven It does though have orchestras the likes of the ECO with Raymond Leppard, La Petite Bande with Kuijken. the SCO with Mackerras, the Staatskappelle Dresden and soloists including Salvatore Accardo, Klara Wurtz, Barbara Hendricks, Ann Murray. Soile Isokowski, Arleen Auger , Helen Donath, Teresa Berganza, Thomas Hampson, Peter Schreier, Thomas Allen and Nicolai Gedda - just to name a few I know.

The Bach box ( which I think is taken from their complete set and has 40 CD's at a cost of £1 per CD) is also not be sniffed at including Bob von Asperen on harpsichord, Ton Koopman on organ and King's College choir conducted by Stephen Cleobury and led by Roy Goodman featuring the likes of Emma Kirkby, Michael Chance and John Mark Ainsley in the Passions. The Beethoven box I have has only 10 cds (again I think selected from the complete set) but features symphonies conducted by Blomstedt, Sonatas played by John Lill and a Diabelli and Bagatelles from Brendel which can't be bad for a Tenner.

Like all the Brilliant productions I've bought I've found the sound and the performance pretty decent and I think my self so fortunate to be able to buy music of such quality at such a price, especially when 25 years ago I would, if I could have afforded it, have been charged £12-16 (which must now be equivalent to the cost of my Bach Box) for a tape of any one of these performances.

Now of course these days I do have several excellent recordings of much of the key repertoire - especially of the Boss - and get something new from being able to hear several different styles of performance of the same work but this new set will be a very welcome reference taking me to parts of the Boss's world I've not yet ventured into. Mind you my best recent bargain is Pinnock's superlative set of the Mozart symphonies on DG for £17 on Amazon last week ( its around £60 in HMV). Now there's a bargain in every sense of the word

Happy listening to all who take advantage of Michael's sharp eyedness in spotting this set. Be good to compare notes when we've had chance to live with it a bit.

[susanwen]

I've placed my order! Thanks, Michael. I don't know how long it will take to get to the United States, and I don't know how much they'll charge for postage - flat rate plus so much per pound. I can guess at the weight, but I don't know if they'll also fill the box with their catalogs and ads.

[Joy]

Sounds like an excellent buy. Thanks for bringing this to our attention!

[Peter]

I've placed my order! Thanks, Michael. I don't know how long it will take to get to the United States, and I don't know how much they'll charge for postage - flat rate plus so much per pound. I can guess at the weight, but I don't know if they'll also fill the box with their catalogs and ads.

Let us know what you make of this when it arrives - it certainly was a good find by Michael and I'm intrigued to know about the performances.

[Michael]

Here is the link to the PDF catalogue which gives details of everything in the set:

http://www.cascade-medien.com/Beetho...te_Edition.pdf

Apart from the booklet which tells you where to find each work, I suspect that there will be little, if any, in the way of liner notes. But that should be no problem nowadays with online resources. I hear the Beethoven Reference Site is particularly good.

[susanwen]

Looking at the picture of the box, this looks like it's made by the same people that made the Complete Works of Bach, which I bought a few months ago at a similarly amazing bargain price from Arkiv. That set is a delight to me, and it includes excellent recordings by excellent conductors. My expectations for the Beethoven set are high!
- Susan

[JA Gardiner]

Just got my set - looking forward to comparing notes but its difficult to know where to start with such a treasury of riches I guess like Maria "I'll start at the very beginning" with the Symphonies in this set which I can compare more easily with the other recordings I own. On the other hand the idea of working my way through chronologically using the list we have on this site to get a proper sense of the Boss's development also attracts. But then again I suppose i could just dive in at random and see what pearls I bring up How are the rest of you who have gone for this set going to approach it?

[Michael]

I had to go for this set also and it arrived after about two weeks. The discs fit neatly into a compact laminated cardboard box and the whole thing is very tastefully done. I never thought it was so easy to get 87 compact discs handed in the door. The only hassle I had was from my wife who wanted to know why I was purchasing this when I already had about 400 discs of Beethoven alone. I tried to explain that I had only one version of quite a lot of minor works and I wanted at least another version. She calmed down a lot when I mentioned the price!
I have been listening to only a few items, obviously, and the sound quality is excellent. As I have multiple sets of the well-known works, I have been concentrating on the “Unheard Beethoven” and have had a few nice surprises.
The compilers really have put the “complete” works into this including half a dozen discs’ worth of tiny Beethoven compositions that the DGG edition turned up its nose at.
A lot of the lieder are sourced from Hermann Prey’s brilliant Capriccio set and a lot of the canons, etc, actually come from the DGG complete edition.
Of course, you won’t get Karajan, Kempff, Mutter in the big works but I’d just like to quote a letter from this month’s BBC Magazine in relation to the Joyce Hatto scandal (recordings issued under her name by her husband using other less well-known pianists):
“Many Hatto recordings received considerable critical acclaim; yet they were for the most part the product of pianists who are not household names. Should we not have heard more of these fine musicians? ….There is in musical circles a kind of snobbery. It sounds better to say you have “Rubinstein’s Chopin Mazurkas” or “Ashkenazy’s Rachmaninov 3” rather than performances by Eugen Indjic or Yefim Bronfan………..”

The only thing I didn’t like about this set is the booklet – 16 pages of small print in which the compositions are listed alphabetically. This is okay when you are looking for Symphonies under “S” but some concerto entries come under “Concerto” or “Konzert”. Try looking for “Fur Elise” and you won’t find it under “F” or “B” for bagatelle. Nope, it’s in the “A”s under “Albumblatt”. It would have been far better to list the works by Opus Number, etc, and then refer you to the relative CD as they do in the DGG. (However, full details of all performers, opus numbers, Hess, etc. are on the back and front of each individual cardboard sleeve). Still, if you don’t know your way around the Beethoven catalogue, it could be a bit of a nightmare.
However, lots of information is available from this site and the “Unheard Beethoven”.
Anyway, to finish up, I am very pleased (as J.A. is) with the latest addition which I found by complete chance.
Again, for fifty euro you can’t go wrong.

Michael

[susanwen]

I ordered it the first day you mentioned it. However, the slow boat from Germany to the United States isn't due to arrive for another few weeks, alas.

[cosplusisin]

wow, thanks for the link! i'll have to keep that in mind when i have some more money... it's a great deal, but it's still a lot of money at the moment. and i'm not sure how much shipping would be to canada.

but thank you for the link.. i hope this set stays at this price for a while.

[Preston]

I ordered it the first day you mentioned it. However, the slow boat from Germany to the United States isn't due to arrive for another few weeks, alas.

susanwen, I am about to order the set myself, thanks Michael, and was wondering if yours arrived, how long it took, and how much the total was with shipping? Thank you for any help.