2005 To 2006 Penguin Guide To Compact Discs And Dvds [Paperback]

This is certainly not a comprehensive or complete guide to classical CDs. While I've been using this guide for a number of years, I'm not finding it to be as useful or as helpful as it once was. In fact there was a time when I relied on this source exclusively, but I've found over the years that I missed out on several great recordings (not to mention composers) that were either overlooked in the book or were give less than 3 stars for whatever reason.

What the editors of the Penguin Guide are attempting to do is to make primary recording recommendations for purchase within the classical repertoire. This is no small feat due to the long history of classical recordings resulting in the shear number of available recordings (even in this time of contraction and deletions by the major labels). However, keep in mind only 3 editors are making these recommendations, and as with any review source, the opinions are highly subjective and biases tend to creep in. The editors are British, and as such, there is a definite bias towards British labels, performers and conductors (Simon Rattle, Vernon Handley and John Eliot Gardner can do no wrong). Anyone using this book as a primary source should be aware of it. I've learned to work around this by weighing the editor's opinions according. Also, I use several other sources for reviews. There are many good sources available in print and online.

Also, and I can't emphasize this enough, there are many, many great recordings overlooked by this guide. Yes, many of these are by American orchestras and labels (believe it or not, American orchestras are capable of performing British music), but there are also several independent labels and releases that get overlooked. Don't let this be your only source when looking for recordings. There are also many great performances that only get a two or two  star rating. The list is too long to list here, but I've been amused by seeing two star ratings next to recordings that are certainly worth three stars. The editors also put a rosette next to recordings they believe to be of special merit. These are highly subjective picks, and I've found over the years that they should not necessarily be a primary recommendation - I've been disappointed with several.

I believe the Penguin Guide to be most useful to the novice collector who is just beginning a collection. Most of the 3 star recordings are fairly solid recommendations (although don't pay particular attention to the order of the reviews - Simon Rattle's Beethoven Symphony cycle should not be the number one cycle to have in anyone's collection, there are too many more worthy cycles out there - at a cheaper price too).

Also, one of the changes that have been made over the past few editions is the addition of DVDs. While I find the DVD reviews interesting, it is not a primary reason that I buy the book. This edition really puts the spotlight on DVD reviews. But what's most irritating is that the DVD reviews come before the CD reviews after each composer entry - often with twice as much space devoted to each DVD entry. I'd rather they spend more time reviewing additional CDs. The DVDs should be in a separate section or better yet, a separate guide.

If you have the previous edition (2003/04), I wouldn't upgrade unless you want the most recent DVD reviews.

Is the Penguin Guide becoming an anachronism that relies too heavily on its timeworn recommendations and lets them get in the way of better new recordings? This is the first question I asked when I purchased the newest guide (apparently written in 2005 and dated 2005-06) and couldn't find any of the newer CDs I had purchased that surely deserve some commendation herein (the new Shostakovich symphony set led by Kitaenko on the Capriccio label being the most obvious.)

I was also taken back when I reviewed the Bach cantata pages and see the current issue continues to list all the complete sets made by groups in the Bach year of 2000. That was six years ago. Doesn't that make these somewhat dated and less deserving of a place in this compendium, given that every single CD of the sets recorded by Rilling, Gardiner and others continues to be included? Even the entire set recorded on the super discount Brilliant label is included!

These were my first impressions. When I looked deeper, I found the Penguin Guide in 2005 still performs the same role it did when it first arrived 30 years eariler: it recommends classic recordings, the best new recordings since its past issue, the best recordings of English music (the authors are British), and probably the best recordings of just about any classical music in which you have interest. Even though they don't list every favorite recording of mine, I found the authors' taste and comments were just as judicious today as ever.

Here's an example: Howard Hanson's Symphony No. 2, or "Romantic" symphony, was first recorded by the composer in the 1950s on Mercury Living Presence. It has since been recorded a bunch of times, with the consensus critical best probably being the performance by the St. Louis Symphony on EMI. The Penguin Guide authors suggest the newly reissued SACD of Hanson's recording does nothing to hide its thin string sound and they demote it a half-star because of that. However, becuase it is a classic recording led by the composer and unlike any other recording of the music, they call it an "indispensable" disk even in light of recordings they rate higher.

An example of this compendium's failure is its steadfast refusal to list a single CD by the late German composer Richard Wetz, the author of three very Bruckner-Mahler like symphonies, a violin concerto and other music, all currently available. While any mediocre British composer can get his or her entire diskography included in the Penguin Guide, there continues to be not a single word published about Richard Wetz or his music, CDs of which have received plentiful critical around the world the past five years.

Even given this obvious and large fault, the Peguin Guide continues to be the top guide in recommending current classical music recordings. As a two or three year guide, it is well ahead of that thing Gramophone magazine produces every year, the Rough Guide and the now hopelessly out of date Third Ear Classical Music, whose editor died shortly after its only printing.

This version does not seem to be as innovative as the last one, which introduced a section on "key" recordings and DVDs. To its credit it lists a group of 100 outstanding recordings (some not otherwise reviewed inside) and 15 wonderful DVDs. In addition, it includes chatter about the emerging Super Audio CD, or SACD, recordings that continue to flood the market. It even talks a bit about surround sound. There aren't many SACDs in this issue but I'm sure that will change as the industry changes.

In the final analysis, this issue let me down a tad compared to past issues, but I think that's because I may be ahead of the curve for this publication in terms of purchasing and collecting classical music CDs. If so, that change is because of me, not the Penguin Guide. Overall, this is still the best bet for any discerning collector that wants to know what the best bets are when purchasing classical music on CD and DVD (and someday on SACD).

I had not really looked at the Penguin Guide since the mid-1990s. My recollection was that its recommendations were rarely trustworthy, and often downright ridiculous, so I thought I just wouldn't bother. Nevertheless, I decided to give this '30th anniversary edition' a try, thinking they might have put in an extra effort for the occasion, and that the book might have improved over the years anyway. I was wrong on both counts.

The book is often poorly written, and there are editing mistakes of a kind I don't recall from the edition I had in the mid-1990s. The new edition seems the outcome of a process of hasty cutting and pasting. The result is that some entries cross-reference others that are no longer there, and (more worryingly) that recommendations are inconsistent. An example of the latter: on page 982, one reads that Pogorelich's performance of Prokofiev's 6th piano sonata is `by far the best version of it ever put on record'. Before rushing over to the record store, however, one should make sure to read another, separate review where one learns that Lugansky's new recording of the same work `is the most exciting and authoritative now before the public and superseded the likes of Pogorelich and Kissin in musical insight and virtuosity.' Such editorial mistakes are surprisingly frequent.

I also found that the reviews of recent recordings were often too short to be of any use. Thus Ilya Gringolts's recent recording of Prokofiev's First Violin Concerto is simply described as `one of the best accounts of the D major Concerto to have appeared in recent years,' while `DG present a perfect balance between soloist and orchestra and a wonderfully transparent orchestral texture'. This is hardly helpful information when one has to choose among dozens of competing recordings by distinguished violinists. Older recordings typically receive a fuller treatment, reinforcing my impression that this new edition was put together too hastily, and that the authors are running out of steam.

As for the recommendations themselves, well, as everybody knows, this guide is written by and for older British gents with staunchly conservative tastes in matters of interpretation (they still haven't quite come around to Glenn Gould's way with Bach, if you can believe that), and an unflinching bias in favour of all things British.

Writing about the book's obvious pro-British bias, another reviewer advises `to get over it'. That would be sound advice if the bias did not affect the quality of the recommendations, but it clearly does. Let me give a few examples, as a friendly warning to the unsuspecting buyer.

The most egregious bias, and the one that chiefly contributes to the guide untrustworthiness, is that in favour of British recording artists, ensembles, and orchestras. To put it mildly, they get more than their fair share of three-star ratings in the guide. Rattle and Gardiner can do no wrong in the authors' view; the London Symphony invariably plays `superbly' or `gloriously', as do pretty much all other British ensembles, large or small; Stephen Hough earns top recommendations for every single note he has ever recorded; even the notoriously uneven Lindsay Quartet systematically gets praised for its technical proficiency (!), and for penetrating deeper in the music than any of their peers. The list could go on and on and on. Now the truth is, there are many good British musicians out there, and there have been a few excellent ones over the course of recorded history. But the idea that they completely dominate the field, as the authors seem to believe, is simply preposterous.

A perhaps less obvious, but also seriously problematic bias is the one in favour of recordings issued on British labels--most obviously Hyperion, Chandos, and ASV. Granted, these are respectable labels. But one is hard pressed to find *any* recording from these labels receiving less than a three-star rating in the guide. Indeed, if there is a decent recording of a work available from one of these labels, it more often than not gets the top recommendation.

A slightly less disturbing bias is in favour of British composers, who tend to get a far broader coverage than their importance warrants. In principle, this does not have to be a problem -- *someone* has to stand up for that least popular of national schools. But unfortunately, important composers get short-changed in the process. York Bowen, Sir George Dyson, and Kenneth Leighton each get the same number of pages as Couperin, while Charles Stanford gets more space than Dutilleux, and Constant Lambert is deemed worth of ten times (!) the space dedicated to Gyorgy Kurtag.

At the end of the day, though, the chief problem with this guide is simply the poor judgment its authors display. They emphasize general production value over artistic merit, so that their top recommendations are usually nicely played, nicely recorded, nicely documented performances that lack any spark. Their esthetic ideal seems to be the Academy of St Martin-in-the-Fields -- polished playing, clarity, elegance, and absolutely no surprises. If this is also what you like, maybe the guide will prove useful to you at times. But even then, you are better off getting your reviews for free on the web from sites like ClassicsToday, ClassicsTodayFrance, and Fanfare Magazine.

› Go to Amazon.com to see all 23 reviews  4.1 out of 5 stars