Ears On

Philips/Decca Cough Up Richter Re-Releases

Mark Fleischmann  |  Jun 20, 2007

In a Diablog about my pianistic hero Sviatoslav Richter, I ended by wishing aloud for the re-release of an 18-disc boxed set Philips originally issued about 15 years ago. Following up with an email, I got this response from Ken of the Decca Music Group: "I'm happy to confirm that all Decca and Philips's Richter recordings are due to be re-released over the coming months, and you'll be able to read about them, with US release date information, on the iClassics site." The first three freshly released two-disc sets entitled Richter: The Master celebrate his command of Beethoven and Mozart, with a third volume of Scriabin, Prokoviev, and Shostakovich and presumably more on the way. The packaging is nothing special but it's great to see this material becoming widely available again. The reissue series will cover both the Philips and Decca catalogues, including (I hope) Richter's late-in-life examinations of Haydn. And it will give a new generation of listeners a chance to buy recordings sold until now only in used form by ripoff artists. Some of the Philips "authorized recordings" titles, issued separately from the box, command secondhand prices as high as $60--and the box itself goes for up to $2000. Me happy boy.

COMMENTS
Bruce's picture
Submitted by Bruce (not verified) on June 20, 2007 - 7:40am

Is there any way to get SACD/DVD Audio on a hard drive? I want the sound quality of SACD/DVD Audio and convenience of an MP3 player at the same time? I also had a question to your comment about Blockbuster going Blu. Why would all eyes be on Netflix if Blockbuster's Version of Netflix still offers both formats in the war?

Mark Fleischmann's picture
Submitted by Mark Fleischmann (not verified) on June 20, 2007 - 8:01am

I'll pass on the first question since it's not germane to this post or anything else I've written. As for the second, good question. My take is that Blockbuster's online operation is not as well established as Netflix, and so if people can't get what they want from Blockbuster's brick-and-mortar stores, they're more likely to gravitate to Netflix than to B'buster's online operation. But will Netflix be willing to maintain double inventory for these two formats indefinitely when Blockbuster is already starting to balk at that?

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