Justin & Jerry's Hifi Blog

[Ronksley]

Yes, I think you are right - just need to persevere with classical searches and try and sneak your way in!

I've had a hankering after Rozhdestvensky's complete Vaughan Williams symphonies (yes, really!) for quite a while but never quite persuaded myself to part with the ££ for the CDs ---- but YES the set is on Tidal. - haven't listened yet, my Broadband Unlimited has only just now switched on. Later today I'll give it a 'spin'.

Lessee - Shostakovich / Rozh --- at first glance there are some 7, 9 10 -- probably more once you dig in. Also a whole series (25-30 or so) of various Rozh called Classical Masters - Bruckner (yum!), Sibelius, Prokofiev, Scriabin .....
All told over 100 albums with Rozh - some aren't even titled properly by composer! - what a mess! - it will be fun investigating them, though.

The Rozh RVW is good felt I was taking a bit of a risk buying the CD boxset but so glad I did unfortunately the quality is poor just radio broadcasts
Hope you enjoy them
The Shostakovich set on Olympia sound fantastic
I just dont have the kit or bandwith to stream only get about 2.5mb

[jandl100]

Have you got a smartphone Jerry? I don't think you have but maybe you have bought one?

Yup, I now have a smartphone - I'm proper 21st century now.
Why?

[jandl100]

The Rozh RVW is good felt I was taking a bit of a risk buying the CD boxset but so glad I did unfortunately the quality is poor just radio broadcasts
Hope you enjoy them

Listening to RVW2 now - decent sound, main drawback is it's a little opaque sounding. Sound is 'average' give or take a bit, which is fine in the circumstances!

[User211]

Yup, I now have a smartphone - I'm proper 21st century now.
Why?

Download the TIDAL app. Then you can download albums onto to phone. You don't then need a Wi-Fi connection to play them back.

This might be good to stop you needing unlimited broadband at your other residence. You could just stream the downloaded albums to a Bluetooth 4 receiver into a DAC.

It is also brilliant in the car if your stereo has an aux input. Just by my Griffin Bluetrip in the classifieds for £15 and you will have hands free calls through your car hi-fi and Bluetooth sound playback via TIDAL.

If you can add a 32GB stick to your phone you can hold about 80 lossless albums on it. Cool.

The Android TIDAL app is awesome.

[jandl100]

Heh - I'm getting the hang of the TIDAL classical searches now ....

If you want the classic Sveshnikov recording of Rachmaninov's Vespers, whatever you do don't type in Rachmaninov or Rachmaninoff that just confuses it. Type in Sveshnikov Vespers and up it pops!

And if you want Abbado's final Bruckner 9th symphony, don't type in Abbado - type in Bruckner Lucerne

It's harder and more devious than the Times' crossword.

[User211]

Nah - I just typed in Sveshnikov and two Vespers came up straight away under albums. One was called Vespers 37 though. Dunno what that is.

You'll get used to it

[User211]

Your like the man who is at 30,000 feet who complains he doesn't have enough leg space. He forgets that what is happening is totally f^&*%*£" amazing - he is in an armchair 30,000 ft above the ground flying to a destination 1,000s of miles away from home.

Find said CD in your 3,000 CD collection and play it anywhere near as quickly.

Bit moving that Vesper stuff. Gulp.

[jandl100]

Actually, I could find and load the CD much more quickly than I could find the TIDAL file.
My CD collection is alphabetical by composer, and structured within the composer grouping as well.

Try typing in the composer, Rachmaninov, and anything else into TIDAL search - I don't think you'll find it then.

But yes, after playing with it for several hours today I am totally gobsmacked by the breadth and depth of the classical music on TIDAL - and by the sound quality as well, excellent imho.

[User211]

As I said, for classical, search by performer, NOT composer.

Once you are used to it there's NO WAY finding that CD will be quicker. Anyway, I'm just really glad I've got you into it. You will love it

[jandl100]

As I said, for classical, search by performer, NOT composer.

No, that makes no sense for most classical recordings - type in Berlin Philharmonic and you'll probably get many hundreds of recordings to search through!

Sometimes you just have to try a few things to dig particular recordings out, and have a reasonable knowledge of the recording you are trying to find.
Most recordings are easily found, though, and pop out like squeezing a spot.

It's not a complaint, just an observation - as you say it would be churlish to criticise such a wonderful compendium of musical treasure.

--- I've just come across this recording of the Vespers on TIDAL - just as wonderful as the Sveshnikov and better more modern sound. I'd never even heard of it before.