Your favourite musical things

[teamsaint]

It occurs to me that we are almost all collectors of music one way or another, but I don't think we have even done a thread on our favourite CDs, box sets , LPs, or even cassettes (!) , not for the actual music but as things of beauty in themselves.

I was just choosing a CD from the Dana Ciocarle Schumann box, which is a rather lovely thing, so that would go down as one of mine.
Among the vinyl, Siouxsie and the Banshees Join Hands might make the cut for the terrific gatefold sleeve .

So, some of your favourite objects from your collections, please.

[Joseph K]

Probably the box that I've got the most pleasure from is the complete Miles Davis on Columbia, even though it is incomplete owing to the fact that some of its contents were in my flat when it was burgled (though thankfully the box itself and most its contents were not). Though, come to think of it, and perhaps weirdly, I don't think I've listened to every disk in it yet. So I've never gone systematically through it like I did with the Boulez Columbia box, but in terms of discovering great music and playing it over and over again, it's the Miles which is number one with me... quite funny to think that when I bought it, just as it came out (2009) generally if you wanted to check some music out, you'd buy the CD. The disks I was most interested in were the Second Great Quintet ones and others mostly from the 60s.

[Petrushka]

Many will know that I'm a big fan of those large boxed sets collecting together 'the complete recordings of .......' even when I already have many, or even most, of them in previous CD incarnations. Some of these are unexpected works of beauty, lovingly produced and lavishly presented with coffee table books containing superb documentation.

Probably my favourite amongst them is the Complete Columbia Recordings of George Szell which is superb in every way and with hardly a duff performance in the entire box.

I would also have to include my numerous signed programmes.

[johncorrigan]

One of my all-time favourite records is 'Orchestra Baobab - Pirates Choice - The Legendary 1982 Session'. In the late 80s I had an interview for a job which I wanted very much and I was really nervous. The day before the interview I was browsing the records in HMV in Dundee and saw this record with a huge Baobab Tree on the front. On the back were sleeve notes written by Charlie Gillett - I'd never heard of him, but the combination of the wonderful front cover, and the Charlie's inspirational words made me head for the checkout desk. I took the record home and played it for hours and it really calmed me. I have always been so delighted that I chanced on that great record and still love to look at the cover. When they made the CD version they took the Baobab Tree away...never understood that. And, I got the job too, and I never regretted that either.

https://www.discogs.com/Orchestra-Baobab-Pirates-Choice/release/1556092

[teamsaint]

One of my all-time favourite records is 'Orchestra Baobab - Pirates Choice - The Legendary 1982 Session'. In the late 80s I had an interview for a job which I wanted very much and I was really nervous. The day before the interview I was browsing the records in HMV in Dundee and saw this record with a huge Baobab Tree on the front. On the back were sleeve notes written by Charlie Gillett - I'd never heard of him, but the combination of the wonderful front cover, and the Charlie's inspirational words made me head for the checkout desk. I took the record home and played it for hours and it really calmed me. I have always been so delighted that I chanced on that great record and still love to look at the cover. When they made the CD version they took the Baobab Tree away...never understood that. And, I got the job too, and I never regretted that either.
https://www.discogs.com/Orchestra-Ba...elease/1556092

Lovely story, JC. Must give that a listen.

I don't have a story to go with it, but for me, one of the most stunning combinations of style and content in my collection is " The Correct Use of Soap" by Magazine. It is a wonderful record, a perfect mix of post punk styling, with pop and soul sensibilities informing the whole record, and the sleeve, a simple but stylish design with no image and typography that speaks to art worlds outside of music , houses it perfectly. The sort of art that speaks to how good things can be , and how well they can be done with a little imagination and ambition.
The sort of things we badly need right now, in fact.

[Bryn]

I am going to deal with a number of categories:

'Classical' Music LPs - The 4 boxed sets which comprise the first complete recorded survey of Beethoven's solo percussive keyboard sonatas on historic instrumets, that by Malcolm Binns. Though the recordings all eventually made it to CD in the L'Oiseau-Lyre Classical and Early Romantic box, only the original LPs has the copious programme notes.

'Popular Music' LPs - Frank Zappa: "Thing Fish" (beautifully presented in what looked very much like a typical classics music boxed set).

'World Music' LPs - Ramnad Krishna:Vidwan, Music of South India.

'Classical' Music CDs - The most recent Sony complete Stravinsky recordings box (the one with the original artwork).

'Popular' Music CDs - Zappa: "You Can't Do That on Stage Anymore" (all 6 volumes).

'World Music' CDs - "Musical Anthology of the Aka Pygmies" (in the double-CD-height book-type presentation).

DVD Video - Robert Ashley: "Perect Lives".

DVD Audio - "Surround Music" (Alvin Lucier et al).

'Audio DVDs' (DVDV standard but audio only) - Feldman "Music for Piano and Strings" (3 discs).

'Classical' Music Blu-ray Audio - Wagner: Der Ring des Nibelungen (Karajan).

'Polular Music' Blu-ray Audio - XTC: Drums and Wires.

'Classical' Music Blu-ray Video - Mahler: Symphonies 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 &7 (LFO, Abbado).

'Wild Card' - Laurie Anderson: "United States" (in both the LP and CD boxed sets).

[cloughie]

My piano.

[LMcD]

DVD cases:
Monteverdi Vespers (John Eliot Gardiner)
Britten War Requiem (Nelsons)

[Pulcinella]

Brown paper packages tied up with strings?