Beethoven SACD??????

[superpanavision70mm]

Does anyone know of an excellent recording for any Beethoven material on SACD? It's so hard to tell which recordings are good and bad just by looking at the package sometimes, plus the remixing could have been a disaster too....you never know until you play it. I have bought quite a few classical SACD's and have been more disappointed by the majoriyty of them. It also seems like so many of them are at low levels as well and that I have to crank up the volume to get them up where most CD's and SACD's are. Not sure why, but that seems to be the case.

[Wireworm5]

I have the Schubert & Beethoven sacd. Schubert's 8th Unfinished (New York Philharmonic,Bruno Walter) and Beethoven #5(Columbia Symphony Orchestra,Bruno Walter). I'll give it another listen and let you know if I think its a good recording. I however just have it hooked up in stereo through the tape input, so it won't be in multi-channel 'cept throught my receiver DSP. If I remember correct this in an old recording I think from the 50's the symphonies are well done but there is some background hiss that was in the transfer, very slight but noticable.

[Wireworm5]

The hiss is more noticable than I remembered kind of like listening to vinyl. So I honestly can't recomend this sacd.

[kexodusc]

Bethoven's 5th and 7th, Kleiber, Deutsche Grammaphone on SACD is one of the very best SACD's I've heard.

It was recorded originally for the quadraphonic format - so you're listening to a legendary recording the way it was meant to be heard - in multi-channel. This disc should come standard with every SACD player, IMO.

[bobsticks]

I'm not familiar with the Kleiber but I trust Kexo, and he seems emphatic enough. I own the Walter SACD, and while I agree that there is a fair amount of hiss, the quality of the performance makes it a wash for me.
Check out the "Living Stereos" Violin Concerto in D and the 5th Symphony/6th Symphony 'Pastoral'" as both have comendable performances and good sq.
If DVD-A is an option Silverline Clasic's Symphony No.5 and No.3 might be a good bet, especially if median recording levels are that big of an issue.

Have fun...

[Dusty Chalk]

Does anyone know of an excellent recording for any Beethoven material on SACD? It's so hard to tell which recordings are good and bad just by looking at the package sometimes, plus the remixing could have been a disaster too....you never know until you play it. I have bought quite a few classical SACD's and have been more disappointed by the majoriyty of them. It also seems like so many of them are at low levels as well and that I have to crank up the volume to get them up where most CD's and SACD's are. Not sure why, but that seems to be the case.Sounds to me like you're used to compressed music. Just run it through a cheap compressor, like the RNC...

Seriously, do you notice how during the loud sections, it actually gets louder? That's called "dynamics".

J/GYAHT...

[superpanavision70mm]

Well, maybe I should look the word "dynamics" up in the dictionary before continuing to post things on this website. Apparently I don't have a clue about anything music related.

Does it get louder during some sections? Yes. However, it just seems like alot of the classical stuff is still at a lower level altogether even despite having louder sections. There are other SACD's like this...not just classical, but the frequency is much higher in the classical genre.

Secondly, I am hardly the person who listens to compressed music often.

[musicman1999]

I second the vote for the Living Stereo series,i do not have any by Beethoven,but i have a few by others and the sound quality is uniformly excellent.All are mixed in either 2 or 3 channel.Classical music ,when recorded well has a wide dynamic range,far wider than most music.Whisper quiet to rock concert loud in one passage.


bill

[Feanor]

Bethoven's 5th and 7th, Kleiber, Deutsche Grammaphone on SACD is one of the very best SACD's I've heard.

It was recorded originally for the quadraphonic format - so you're listening to a legendary recording the way it was meant to be heard - in multi-channel. This disc should come standard with every SACD player, IMO.

While Kleiber's performances are super, the same isn't true of the multi-channel on this SACD; the multichannel effect is relatively unconvincing and the over all sound quality is mediocre (in the DGG mold). Unfortunately I don't have another Beethoven I can recommend but I do have a few much better SACD multi-channel recordings.

[superpanavision70mm]

Thanks Feanor...that's what I suspected...disasterous mixes.

[kexodusc]

While Kleiber's performances are super, the same isn't true of the multi-channel on this SACD; the multichannel effect is relatively unconvincing and the over all sound quality is mediocre (in the DGG mold). Unfortunately I don't have another Beethoven I can recommend but I do have a few much better SACD multi-channel recordings.

Well I'll respect your opinion and chalk it up to personal preference - though it often suggested as the best Beethoven mc mix on most SACD forums I frequent. Maybe it is the performance carrying the disc, but I feel it captures the ambience almost perfectly.
But let's say it does suck - the 2.0 mix in hi-rez is still worth the price of this disc!!!!

Here's one of the better reviews I've read on it.
http://www.highfidelityreview.com/reviews/review.asp?reviewnumber=18786010

I also have the Karajan version of the 5th (which I bought just to get the 6th). It's nowhere near as good, but it is still a very good mc disc. Some people like the 6th more than the 7th (most probably), I always thought the 7th was underrated. I can't remember which lable did the Karajan SACD.

Personally, I didnt' think much of my vinyl and CD version of the Kleiber DGG performance. SACD sold me that it is one of, if not the best, recording of the 5th.

[Woochifer]

Well I'll respect your opinion and chalk it up to personal preference - though it often suggested as the best Beethoven mc mix on most SACD forums I frequent. Maybe it is the performance carrying the disc, but I feel it captures the ambience almost perfectly.
But let's say it does suck - the 2.0 mix in hi-rez is still worth the price of this disc!!!!

Here's one of the better reviews I've read on it.
http://www.highfidelityreview.com/reviews/review.asp?reviewnumber=18786010

On your recommendation, I did buy that Kleiber SACD (Best Buy was selling it for $12) and while the recording quality is good, I was even more impressed with the performance -- definitely one of the better interpretations of the 5th and 7th that I've heard. It seems that a lot of these ported quad recordings do a decent job of conveying the hall ambience, and put more of the hall reverberations into the surrounds. I would put the Kleiber disc into the same category. Some of the newer multichannel recordings, seem to feature less of the hall reverb and emphasize more precise placement of the front soundstage and the side imaging. It only falls a little short IMO with the dynamics where other multichannel SACDs I've heard seem to do a better job. But, the instruments are well differentiated and the tonality is pretty good.

And it's a lot better than Telarc's recording of the 9th with Runnicles and the Atlanta Symphony. The multichannel track sounds flat, but the performance is even less inspiring.


I also have the Karajan version of the 5th (which I bought just to get the 6th). It's nowhere near as good, but it is still a very good mc disc. Some people like the 6th more than the 7th (most probably), I always thought the 7th was underrated. I can't remember which lable did the Karajan SACD.

Karajan was DG all the way. He's recorded at least three full Beethoven cycles with the Berlin Philharmonic (I have no idea which ones have been remixed for multichannel). The last one he did in the late-80s was Karajan's only digitally recorded Beethoven cycle. I got those on CD and compared to other performances I've heard subsequently, Karajan's interpretations come across as overly clinical. I also found the recording quality to be decent, but nothing special. The version of Beethoven's 9th from Karajan's late-70s cycle was better, but the recording there seemed to suffer from excessive multitracking. I don't know anything about how it was actually recorded, but it seemed to have some of the same issues as other mid-70s classical recordings.

[kexodusc]

Wooch:
Glad you enjoyed the Kleiber SACD. I think you touched on something - Is it the MC mix or the performance I'm enjoying most? Hard to say. Most recordings of the 5th I have are disappointing. That SACD's mc mix sounds so much better than any stereo version I have that maybe my frame of reference is skewed a bit. But then again, I seldom notice the quality of the MC mix if the performance or music is bad. Maybe it's not fair to separate the two.

I don't have many SACD's I'm not impressed by - one of the nice things about releasing mainly tried and proven classics.

[bobsticks]

if you're not tied to full orchestral works you could try Beethoven's Op.97 "Archduke" & Op. 1 No.3 in C Minor by The Kempf Trio SACD (BIS Records, BIS-SACD-1172). Excellent sq despite the pianist having an annoying way of exhaling at the crescendos and the cellist's bow being too loose...

Cheers

[superpanavision70mm]

I wonder if Mobile Fidelity will issue anything in multi-channel from Beethoven. I am loving their SACD's of Gershwin, Holst, Prokofiev, and Ravel.

[Woochifer]

Wooch:
Glad you enjoyed the Kleiber SACD. I think you touched on something - Is it the MC mix or the performance I'm enjoying most? Hard to say. Most recordings of the 5th I have are disappointing. That SACD's mc mix sounds so much better than any stereo version I have that maybe my frame of reference is skewed a bit. But then again, I seldom notice the quality of the MC mix if the performance or music is bad. Maybe it's not fair to separate the two.

I don't have many SACD's I'm not impressed by - one of the nice things about releasing mainly tried and proven classics.

You're right it is hard to say since a great performance will come through regardless of flaws in the recording. Yeah, I wish that the great Arturo Toscanini's work with the NBC Symphony was recorded better, but there's no denying how wonderful many of those performances were. I grew up with Toscanini's take on Beethoven, so it takes some getting used whenever I hear another conductor/orchestra's interpretation, even if the recording quality is far superior. In general, it doesn't matter to me how well something is recorded if the performance is substandard.

For me, the most enjoyable aspect of SACD has been how the multichannel remixes open up a completely new dimension for recordings that I'm very familiar with. Classic Records' 96/24 two-channel Slatkin/St.Louis Symphony/Gershwin disc has been one of my references for the last four years. Great performance and a great recording. But, the 4.0 SACD of that recording from Mobile Fidelity revealed a whole world of nuances that I had never picked up with the two-channel version. The 4.0 mix in this case is how the recording engineers intended the recording to sound since the two-channel version was mixed down from the four-track quad mix. I've never been to Powell Symphony Hall in St. Louis, but after listening to the SACD, I can easily imagine how that room sounds.

As an aside, comparing the two-channel layers for those two discs I noticed how much of an influence the playback chain used during the mastering process has in the end product. On the Mobile Fidelity disc, the SACD layers and CD layers sound more similar to each other than they do to the 96/24 disc from Classic Records. Mobile Fidelity uses a custom built tape player that purportedly has an analog frequency response that approaches 100 kHz, whereas Classic uses restored vintage tape players with tube-based output circuitry.
I can only imagine the improvement with any SACD that simply uses a better tape player during the mastering process, compared to a first generation CD transfer that might not have had as much scrutiny paid to the playback chain. And then there's the improvements with doing the 5.1 remixes with newer digital equipment that does not have the signal loss and tape hiss of older analog equipment -- lots of opportunities for the SACD to improve the listening experience, regardless of how much of the difference comes from the SACD resolution itself.