October 5, 2018
#279
Gentle reader,
I belong to a number of FaceBook groups of people with whom I share interests. I used to belong to a number of LP record groups, but some of the members were.....I'll not say.
I did recently join one devoted to collecting LP vinyl records filled with Classical music.
I'd previously written about the hobby but from the standpoint of learning about the composers and musicians (and orchestras) that created and/or recorded the music.
I am 62 and grew up in a home that often had music playing. Dad had a fairly good stereo based upon what he earned as a Presbyterian minister. He and Mom had varied taste, but Dad like classical which certainly influenced my interest in it.
I also like: Classic Rock, Pop, Comedy, Film and Television Scores (often referred to as "Soundtracks") Jazz, both Smooth and what I call Traditional, Big Band, Classical of course, and even a little Bluegrass. As long as they don't sing. I even have a couple Country CDs. I found both separately, both are autographed and both happen to be beautiful women. Pretty good music.
This is the Classical LP shelves. They are two, but connect to make one. An incredible thrift store find! It appears they were purpose built to house LP records.
This was another, earlier, thrift store find and it too seems to have been (home) made to hold records. I will get around to finishing the wood that the builder did not get around to. It resides in the closet of the listening room.
It has all the Jazz LPs, Big Band as well as Pop such as Frank Sinatra and other singers. Also holds Herb Alpert and spin offs from him, Al Hirt too. I like trumpet music.
Further down are miscellaneous such as International music, Spoken word, Comedy, Historical and Test LPs.
Here is where it all began. This is a cabinet I made from white walnut wood. The type of walnut trees that provide edible walnuts. Rather than black walnut. Inedible nuts, but gorgeous, dark wood. I was 19 at the time and I bought the wood from my girlfriend's father. He taught me how to construct panels from multiple pieces of wood and other techniques of joinery.
The top shelves hold Classic rock and Pop. Bottom shelves house the film and TV scores. Some of them, mostly my wife's are ones with music (not the score) that was featured in the movies. Usually rock or pop artist's works.
This oaken rack was a thrift store find. Must have been made from a kit. It houses 300 CDs. I wrote about my rebuilding and finishing it here:
This shelf and the small rack upon it holds box sets both within and without. Mostly Classical, including one or two which are SACD sets. The blue one on the left is the most expensive CD I have. The Score to Galaxy Quest. My wife spent $65 to get me that CD!
This rack holds 200 CDs and contains the rest of the SACD and HDCD collection. It also holds all my Herb Alpert CDs, Classic Rock, newer Rock and Pop, the two Country CDs and I don't recall what else.
This is a mishmash of three racks. Top holds 100 cassettes of various genres. Both mine and my wife's. In front of it are the three deluxe 2-CD sets of Scores from the three Hobbit films. The middle and right one look funny because they both had flash hot-spots. I eliminated the white spots by replacing it with the color of the boxes.
Beneath that is W to Z of Jazz, then traditional Jazz, Mix CDs of Smooth Jazz, Jazz used in films, Western film Score compilations and compilations of other film Scores.
Bottom is the latest addition and simply did not have any room to mount it vertically. Sigh. It has some modern versions of Big Band as well as original artist stuff both compilations and artist specific. To the right are from the last resurrection of Big Band and modernization thereof. Cherry Popin' Daddies and others. From the 1980's, if I recall. There was a briefer one in the 1970's when Big Band was set to a Disco beat. I have a couple of those on LP. Fun to listen to. One is on clear yellow vinyl.
The biggest for last. This 400 CD rack holds most of the Jazz and most of the film Scores collections. As you can see, I prefer CD storage that holds them horizontally. A PITA* to add new ones since each that will be alphabetically below the new ones must be removed and moved down one at a time.
*Pain In The Ass.
Now, you may be thinking, "Cassettes are rectangular." Yes, but they have tiny round tape reels inside of them. I had reel-to-reel decks in the past, but never collected prerecorded tapes, and decided that they served me no real purpose.
With a CD recorder, middle shelf, on the left, I can copy or compile mix-CDs, record from LPs and even cassettes, and listen to them in the car or elsewhere. The only portable cassette player I have is a Walkman-style one. I never use it. I do have new blank Chromium-Dioxide tapes if I do decide to make some tapes.
Now that I've shown you my entire music collections, let me get back to the subject at hand. Collecting Classical music.
As you no doubt know, "Classical" is generic term for what is sometimes referred to as "Western music". Not to be confused with "Country and Western". Western as opposed to Eastern music, that which originates from Asian countries and composers. The time-frame starts many hundreds of years ago and continues to present day composers. Generally it refers to music made for instruments used in orchestras. Whether solo works for piano or violin, for instance, all the way to massive works which might have hundreds of musicians and a large chorus of singers.
I will not go into the different eras of Classical music those can be learned elsewhere. My preference is Orchestral, the bigger the better. Do I like chamber music? Sure, if I'm in the mood. I don't have a lot of it. Preferring later chamber music. Such as Copland's Appalachian Spring which was originally written for chamber orchestra. For example I agree that Mozart was brilliant. But I don't really care for most of his works. I think I have one LP of his music. Heresy? Nah. Just my preferences.
As far as Baroque, I have most of the more popular works in the collection. No self-respecting Classical music lover would not have some Baroque. But generally I feel that it is overplayed, at least on our local Classical station. And earlier than that, no thank you. Sure, some of it is moving music, just not my thing.
I did take the extremely long time to go through all my LP records, one at a time and enter them into Excel spreadsheet programs for all of the genres. I wrote about that in a three part series. The last is linked below. Previous chapters are linked in the article.
My oldest LP is from 1949, shown below. And it is of my favorite Opera. In fact the only opera which I own. I have several versions of Boris Godounov on LP and CD.
See, lower left corner, above: "copyright, 1949, columbia records, inc." I don't know why it's in lower case.
All my collections are all alphabetized, with the exception of the "Various Composers" Classical LPs which are by label. I also separated the Mono from the Stereo. I at one time tried to have a separate mono music system, then realized it was silly.
My collection exceeds 3000 discs and I doubt that I will ever listen to them all. I even stopped buying music after completing the database. But eventually started buying again. You either have the collecting gene, or you do not.
You probably also know this: a Song must have Singing. If there is no singing, it is a Piece of music. Or a tune, if you prefer. Or even a Work. I know, I'm a bit anal.
Two of my all-time favorite Classical works are Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture and Beethoven's Ninth Symphony. I have not counted them in a while, but I have a LOT of each of them. Both large, grandiose pieces, for sure. But that is what I told you earlier that I liked.
Final words. We moved to Richmond, Virginia from Denver, Colorado right after I graduated from high school in the 1970's. Every 4th of July, the Richmond Symphony performs at a place called Dogwood Dell. It has a natural amphitheater. Behind the bandstand is where they place the howitzer canons from Fort Lee. One cannot see them unless you are off to the side or way up at the top. I would climb to the top as the 1812 played and ease my way over to the left side. I wanted to watch the canons fire. Of course, the 1812 Overture in condensed form, is the last piece they played.
There are three sensations to explosions, in the order received by our brains: Sight, then Sound, then Concussion. Granted they are firing blanks, and probably low loads of powder since many people are nearby. But as a teen who played Army as a kid, seeing, hearing and feeling those canons fire, WOW it was awesome!
I want to thank you, once again for taking the time to read my humble blog. When I set out all those years ago, it was just something to do. Little did I dream that people, lots of people would actually read and enjoy my writing and photographs. But it is each readers choice to click on that link and start to read. You chose to do that, and I thank you. You, make it all worthwhile.
Scott
October 5, 2018
#279
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