Kempe on Scribendum

Here are some Kempe recordings on Scribendum, advertised at hmv.co.jp. From what I read on the web site, some of these (and possibly other Scribendum items) seem to be prepared by requests from stores in Japan, which would explain the reason of non-exporting items as someone reported.

SCRD1 - Reader's Digest recordings All are with Royal Phil., recorded in stereo, remastered by Ian Jones. R. Strauss: Alpine Symphony (1964) R. Strauss: Don Jean (1964 May) Dvorak: Symphony No. 9 (1963 May) Respighi: Pines of Roma (1964 May) R. Strauss: Horn Concerto No. 1 (1967 April, Civil) Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 5 (1964, Firkusny) Chopin: Piano Concerto No. 2 (1966 April, Cherkassky)

SC004 – Live recording on Nov. 29, 1972 in Duesseldorf With Munich Phil. (a charity concert) Wagner: Meistersinger, Prelude to 1st Act Mozart: Piano Concerto No. 27 (with Gulda) Dvorak: Symphony No. 8

SC003 – Bruckner With Munich Phil., recorded in 1975/6 Bruckner: Symphony No. 4 Bruckner: Symphony No. 5

SC002 – Brahms Four Symphonies with Munich Phil. (1974/5) (Probably with some other orchestral pieces)

SC001 - with Zurich Tone Halle Orchestra Beethoven: Symphony No. 5 (1971) Dvorak: Symphony No. 9 (1971)

I have SC003 and would buy some of others one of these days...

I would greatly appreciate a report on the quality of this transfer from anyone who has the chance to hear it. (wonder why they call it a 'Reader's Digest' recording

I need somebody's insight and knowledge. HMV.co.jp says the recordings were distributed (or sold) to members of RD subscribers. I do not know this was meant for the US or Japan. Some of the 'RD' recording were also reissued as CDs from Chesky with a good remasterings in the past. HMV.co.jp also states this is the first batch of the RD series from Scribendum. So more will come.

ReDiscovery says 'Till Eulenspiegel is another Gerhardt production, from his days with Reader's Digest records.' Could someone please enlighten me about RD records, its history and things recorded?

The Reader's Digest recordings were produced by a special division of RCA Victor. Charles Gerhardt was the producer for the majority of these, which were recorded in Europe. There were far too many recordings made to list them; they would come out in multi-LP sets of anywhere from 5-15 (or thereabouts) records. Conductors at first included folk like Rene Leibowitz, Arturo Basile, Odd Gruner-Hegge, Massimo Freccia, Alexander Gibson, Sir Adrian Boult. As the series progressed they were able to acquire the services of such as Barbirolli, Horenstein, Kempe, Munch, Morton Gould, Dorati, Reiner, etc. They had some excellent soloists as well, including Earl Wild, Michel Block, Lympany, etc.

The LPs were sold only via mail order in the US. The distribution was limited, but they built up quite a reputation because of the excellence of the production values. Gerhardt had a knack for getting brilliant sound from even second-tier ensembles in dubious venues. And of course, the relative scarcity of the records helped to enhance their desirability as the years went on.

Gerhardt himself took the podium and made some outstanding recordings in the series. Sometimes he was conducting so much that they invented pseudonymns like 'Eric Hammerstein' to cover his tracks. He got to do a lot of his own transcriptions, like an amazing arrangement of Liszt's 'Mephisto Waltz'. (And there was British composer Douglas Gamley, who also recorded a lot for the series, and sometimes his own over-the-top transcriptions, like 'Great Gate at Kiev' from Mussorgsky's Pictures, which somehow tops even Stokowski's!)

All in all, the RD series was probably the finest not-sold-in-stores major series of classical recordings in the LP era. If Scribendum is going to do a whole series of them, and IF they have good sources and make good transfers, I'm in line for all of them.

None of these ever got near a Chesky CD did they? Wonder why?

avoid this one, i find it totally uninspiring. for his beethoven, get the whole set on disky.

It may have been an British LP...maybe it was the Mozart horn concertos that appeared on US RCA.

I don't recall which RD box the 'Emperor' was in, tho I do recall they had a box of 'Great Piano concertos, but I don't know for sure it was in there.