Grieg & Schumann – Piano Concerti – Cherkassky / LPO / Boult – FLAC

My transfer from unplayed vinyl. Cover scans included.

https://mega.nz/#!lpADSbJQ!yBTN-yXqGD2aHr4ftr3Ai5i9f-HuTTeZBZGTXIc6tJ0

This project is over a year in the making; two gorgeous recordings originally made in 1966 that have never been re-released on CD. Of course, many recordings from yesteryear are forgotten today – whether they were just poor in the first place or because they have been superseded by better performances by better musicians – but the abandonment of this one beggars belief. The archive labels are missing a real golden opportunity. One of the world’s great pianists, one of the world’s great orchestras, and perhaps the most famous British conductor of all time.

It’s not as though we are starved of good recordings of either of these two works; perhaps the two most over-recorded, over-exposed, and as a consequence under-appreciated in the piano repertoire. That said, even in a crowded marketplace, this IS a good recording – a very good one; it deserves better treatment, and above all it deserves to be heard.

Initially released on vinyl in 1966 by the World Record Club, it went through a number of re-releases – including a completely bizzare one in the United States that features an embarassingly dated and completely unrelated picture of a glamorous female model seductively fingering a piano.

Finally, in 1979, Chevron Records made what would turn out to be its final re-issue – on cassette and vinyl – the pressing used to make this transfer. During the course of this project, I obtained multiple copies of the 1966 MFP release in various states of deterioration and I managed to track down the Chevron cassette, which sounded terrible. (Not just "cassette terrible" but actually legitimately terrible.)

I was midway through a long and torturous restoration process on the MFP release when, whilst searching for something else completely, I inadvertantly stumbled over a copy of the Chevron LP in mint condition – unplayed and sealed in shrinkwrap. I had worried that the quality of the Chevron pressing would be poor – they were a budget re-issue label and generally speaking, any LP that squashes half-an-hour a side is bad news – but my worries were instantly washed away upon first playback. Suffice to say, I immediately binned the MFP transfer and got to work on this one. This is good stuff, folks – not just good for vinyl, or good for the age… but truly good and worth of a place in any collection.

As with so many vintage recordings, this one badly needs a professional re-release from the mastertapes – but until one arrives, this will do very nicely.