RCA Victor Living Stereo

[Late]

This may have come up at some point in the what-are-you-listening-to thread (or somewhere else), but I thought I'd start a separate thread to draw attention to this wonderful series that I've only recently discovered. I guess it's been ongoing since 2004, and there have been six batches of titles to date.

This is the way a series should be done! Hybrid SACD, and with a list price of $11.99! Right now, I'm listening to Julian Bream's Spanish Guitar Classics, and it is phenomenal, both musically and sonically.

Don't sleep on this series like I did for so long. It doesn't seem likely to go out-of-print any time soon, but the music demands hearing. I couldn't find a complete list anywhere (not even on the Sony/BMG site), but Tower seems to carry most of them, and for a couple bucks under list, here.

Any favorites in this series?

[Late]

Forgot to add that many discs in this series — even though they hail from the late 50's/early 60's — are actually in genuine multichannel sound — nothing artificially "rechanneled." I don't have a multichannel player, but I bet they sound awesome.

[jazzbo]

I've bought a number of these from yourmusic.com . . . worth looking in to for the price. . . !

[HolyStitt]

I have tried to follow which releases were in the series, but also seem to have a problem finding a definitive list, so thank you for the link.

So far I only have the Reiner Bartok: Concerto for Orchestra/Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta/Hungarian Sketches & Also sprach Zarathustra/Ein Heldenleben, but this list has pointed me in the direction of a few more titles.

[DMP]

The multi-channel aspect, when it's available on these, is just for 3 channels. And you're right - this is a fine series - excellent (and, in a couple of cases, very popular) recordings reissued in a first-class way. I read once that the old Columbia catalog would enjoy a similar reissue program, now that the companies have merged, but haven't heard anything about that lately and wonder if it's still in the works.

[Claude]

  DMP said:

I read once that the old Columbia catalog would enjoy a similar reissue program, now that the companies have merged, but haven't heard anything about that lately and wonder if it's still in the works.

In fact most of the Sony Classical SACDs released so far consist of vintage recordings, but there haven't been new SACD reissues for years. Some titles available on single layer SACDs (most of which are now OOP) have been reissued on DSD-mastered CDs.

http://www.sa-cd.net/titles/0/1/date/5/1

I agree that the Living Stereo SACDs are excellent. I have most of them.

http://www.sa-cd.net/titles/0/296/date/100/1

Edited May 15, 2007 by Claude

[Bluerein]

5 new titles are sceduled for a late june release. Some Reiner CSO (Strauss and Mahler), Rubinstein (Saint-Saëns/Liszt/Franck), Van Cliburn (Beethoven/Schumann) and one I forgot.

[chewy-chew-chew-bean-benitez]

I dont mean to pull a Freakouldt on you guys: BUT WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU GUYS OH MY GOD I DONT EVEN KNOW WHERE TO BEGIN WITH THIS::::::: THE WHOLE BEAUTY OF RCA VICTOR LIVING STEREO WAS THAT IT WAS FOR ***RECORDS*** AND IF YOU REISSUE AN RCA VICTOR LIVING STEREO ALBUM ON DIGITAL COMPACT DISC IT DOES NOT TRANSLATE AND THE WHOLE BEAUTY OF RCA LIVING STEREO IS LOST>>>>>>>ITS AKIN TO, OH, IF I CUT A WHOLE IN MY CYBILL SHEPHERD ALBUM COVER AND MADE SEXY-TIME WITH IT, AND THEN GOING AROUND SAYING I HOOKED UP WITH CYBILL SHEPHERD.

[Shawn]

I was going to post something about this series...but Aric's "Made Sexy-Time" remark just derailed all thought processes....

Edited May 17, 2007 by Shawn

[chewy-chew-chew-bean-benitez]

the real ironic thing is it takes a 26 yr old who never even SAW the 50s to point this out to a bunch of elder men who actually expierenced it! sha-zam!

[4XB]

  chewy said:

I dont mean to pull a Freakouldt on you guys: BUT WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU GUYS OH MY GOD I DONT EVEN KNOW WHERE TO BEGIN WITH THIS::::::: THE WHOLE BEAUTY OF RCA VICTOR LIVING STEREO WAS THAT IT WAS FOR ***RECORDS*** AND IF YOU REISSUE AN RCA VICTOR LIVING STEREO ALBUM ON DIGITAL COMPACT DISC IT DOES NOT TRANSLATE AND THE WHOLE BEAUTY OF RCA LIVING STEREO IS LOST>>>>>>>ITS AKIN TO, OH, IF I CUT A WHOLE IN MY CYBILL SHEPHERD ALBUM COVER AND MADE SEXY-TIME WITH IT, AND THEN GOING AROUND SAYING I HOOKED UP WITH CYBILL SHEPHERD.

D`nt Fool with a Fool!!! (Ben Webster)

[tonym]

It's almost like Aric's back....

[Kevin Bresnahan]

  chewy said:

I dont mean to pull a Freakouldt on you guys: BUT WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU GUYS OH MY GOD I DONT EVEN KNOW WHERE TO BEGIN WITH THIS::::::: THE WHOLE BEAUTY OF RCA VICTOR LIVING STEREO WAS THAT IT WAS FOR ***RECORDS*** AND IF YOU REISSUE AN RCA VICTOR LIVING STEREO ALBUM ON DIGITAL COMPACT DISC IT DOES NOT TRANSLATE AND THE WHOLE BEAUTY OF RCA LIVING STEREO IS LOST>>>>>>>ITS AKIN TO, OH, IF I CUT A WHOLE IN MY CYBILL SHEPHERD ALBUM COVER AND MADE SEXY-TIME WITH IT, AND THEN GOING AROUND SAYING I HOOKED UP WITH CYBILL SHEPHERD.

If you heard one of these recordings on 3 channel SACD, you'd cream your pants as if you were with Cybill Shepherd. The realism acheived with the full sound stage of 3 channels cannot be described. You can't get this from vinyl.

[Late]

Would you agree or disagree with AMG's review of Heifetz's recording of Bruch's Violin Concerto:

"When these recordings were made in the early '60s, Jascha Heifetz was reaching the end of his long and successful career. And, unfortunately, it sounds that way. His once polished virtuoso technique was starting to fray -- fast passages are smudged, long lines are blurred, bow strokes are too vehement -- and his once famous tone was beginning to dim -- what had been focused, intense, and riveting is now narrow, thin, and even occasionally cracked. While these qualities might conceivably have worked in some repertoire -- possibly Prokofiev or Shostakovich, perhaps Stravinsky or Schoenberg -- they don't work at all in Bruch's lyrically expansive Violin Concerto No. 1 and ardently nostalgic Scottish Fantasy or in Vieuxtemps' brilliant to the point of brittleness Violin Concerto No. 5. Accompanied by the enthusiastic but insensitive Malcolm Sargent leading the professional but lackluster New Symphony Orchestra of London -- a nom de registrement for an otherwise anonymous group of London session players -- Heifetz sounds like he's merely going through the motions."

Ouch!

[J.A.W.]

  Late said:

Would you agree or disagree with AMG's review of Heifetz's recording of Bruch's Violin Concerto:

"When these recordings were made in the early '60s, Jascha Heifetz was reaching the end of his long and successful career. And, unfortunately, it sounds that way. His once polished virtuoso technique was starting to fray -- fast passages are smudged, long lines are blurred, bow strokes are too vehement -- and his once famous tone was beginning to dim -- what had been focused, intense, and riveting is now narrow, thin, and even occasionally cracked. While these qualities might conceivably have worked in some repertoire -- possibly Prokofiev or Shostakovich, perhaps Stravinsky or Schoenberg -- they don't work at all in Bruch's lyrically expansive Violin Concerto No. 1 and ardently nostalgic Scottish Fantasy or in Vieuxtemps' brilliant to the point of brittleness Violin Concerto No. 5. Accompanied by the enthusiastic but insensitive Malcolm Sargent leading the professional but lackluster New Symphony Orchestra of London -- a nom de registrement for an otherwise anonymous group of London session players -- Heifetz sounds like he's merely going through the motions."

Ouch!

It's been many years since I heard this performance and I don't own the CD, so I can't really comment.

I found this Gramophone (U.K.) review of the earlier CD reissue of these recordings:

Reviewed: Gramophone 3/1988, Edward Greenfield

As Trevor Harvey pointed out in his original review in 1962, this Heifetz version of the Scottish Fantasy has some cuts, small ones in orchestral tuttis, but substantial ones in the finale, reducing it by some three minutes. Even then TH was prepared to forgive the aberration when this master among virtuosos was inspired to ''far more than acrobatics''. Now as we mourn Heifetz's death, it makes a superb memorial issue, and I totally endorse TH's praise for the Maestro's ''range of colour, his subtlety of line, his feeling''. Even more than most of his records of the post-war period, this account of the Scottish Fantasy makes nonsense of the idea of Heifetz as either cold or ruthless, when it so consistently speaks of his deep personal love of a then-neglected work.

The G minor Concerto too (originally coupled with Mozart's No. 4 in A) finds Heifetz at his sweetest and most sympathetic, with even the incidental passagework shaped winningly. It is a lesson too that though the balance of the soloist is close, there is never any mistaking as I fear there often is with Itzhak Perlman's even more marked preference for close balancing whether or not the soloist is producing a genuine pianissimo. With Heifetz one fully registers the hush even from an instrument placed close, magically so in the slow movement.

Like the Scottish Fantasy, with which it was originally coupled on LP, the Vieuxtemps needs and gets a committedly persuasive advocate here. The work is no longer as neglected as when this recording originally appeared, but there is no more commanding version than this on disc. Unlike some of the earlier RCA transfers to CD of Heifetz performances these English-made recordings come up very well indeed in the new digital transfer, with the violin sound very full and immediate and with a fine sense of presence and only the occasional hardness on orchestral violin tone to betray age. Generous measure too.'

Edward Greenfield

Edited May 18, 2007 by J.A.W.

[Late]

Thanks for posting that review, Hans. I actually haven't heard Heifetz's edition of the Bruch, but was thinking about picking it up after hearing Akiko Suwanai's edition and reading how hers compared favorably to Heifetz's.

My ears aren't as discerning when it comes to classical music, but the AMG review raised my eyebrows. Could Heifetz's performance possibly be that failed? I generally try to decide for myself, but when I'm exploring a branch of music that's relatively new to me ...

=======

Another discovery (along RCA lines) — EMI has at least three series in their classical catalog that appear to all contain the same recordings ... possibly with different remasterings?

• EMI Great Recordings of the Century

• EMI Historical

• EMI Encore

For example, you can purchase certain Maria Callas recordings of what seems to be the same material in all three series. I guess I'll figure things out eventually ...

[Ron S]

Remind me never to borrow a Cybill Shepherd album from Aric.

[J.A.W.]

  Late said:

Another discovery (along RCA lines) — EMI has at least three series in their classical catalog that appear to all contain the same recordings ... possibly with different remasterings?

• EMI Great Recordings of the Century

• EMI Historical

• EMI Encore

For example, you can purchase certain Maria Callas recordings of what seems to be the same material in all three series. I guess I'll figure things out eventually ...

EMI reissued their top (or maybe I should say "most popular") classical recordings time and time again, most of them in new remasterings. The "Great Recordings of the Century" series is 24-bit remastered, but I don't like the sound on the ones I had: too aggressive, especially the string sound.

Edited May 18, 2007 by J.A.W.

[Kevin Bresnahan]

  Ron S said:

Remind me never to borrow a Cybill Shepherd album from Aric.

You'd have to pry it from his cold, sticky hands.

[sidewinder]

  Ron S said:

Remind me never to borrow a Cybill Shepherd album from Aric.

Or 'Forest Flower' by Charles Lloyd.

[Peter Johnson]

Up because I'm curious whether this series is dead--does anyone know? It doesn't look like there have been any releases since 2007 or so. There had been an "official" RCA Victor site about these releases, but I can't find it. Thoughts would be appreciated!

[Ron S]

Unfortunately, Peter, it does appear to be dead in terms of new releases.

By the way, in case you haven't seen it, here's an interesting thread on this series on the Hoffman forum, started by the man himself (I haven't read the whole thread--just quickly skimmed it):

http://www.stevehoff...ad.php?t=200306

[mikeweil]

  On 5/17/2007 at 5:49 AM, chewy said:

I dont mean to pull a Freakouldt on you guys: BUT WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH  YOU GUYS OH MY GOD I DONT EVEN KNOW WHERE TO BEGIN WITH THIS:::::::  THE WHOLE BEAUTY OF RCA VICTOR LIVING STEREO WAS THAT IT WAS FOR ***RECORDS*** AND IF YOU REISSUE AN RCA VICTOR LIVING STEREO ALBUM ON DIGITAL COMPACT DISC IT DOES NOT TRANSLATE AND THE WHOLE BEAUTY OF RCA LIVING STEREO IS LOST>>>>>>>ITS AKIN TO, OH, IF I CUT A WHOLE IN MY CYBILL SHEPHERD ALBUM COVER AND MADE SEXY-TIME WITH IT, AND THEN GOING AROUND SAYING I HOOKED UP WITH CYBILL SHEPHERD.

I see your point, but if you have SACD playback equipment, these really do sound awesome.

If there is anything in audio playback that can come close to good vinyl playback, it's SACD, given the original recording was well done.

[Claude]

  On 10/20/2010 at 9:29 PM, mikeweil said:

I see your point, but if you have SACD playback equipment, these really do sound awesome.

If there is anything in audio playback that can come close to good vinyl playback, it's SACD, given the original recording was well done.

And SACD has a bonus vinyl can't offer. Many of these Living Stereo productions were 3-track recordings. The SACD reissues contain both the 3-track mix (on the right/center/left channels of the multichannel layer) and the stereo downmix (on the stereo layer).

[chewy-chew-chew-bean-benitez]

youre right, i wanna give it a try. i for the 1st time ever am rELLaLALY getting into classical-on-cd i got a denon pcm-digital series swan lake i really like and a ton RCA victor redseals. so youre saying sacd is better than that>? i need to hear this