December 6, 2009: A gift of Brahms that will keep on giving

Regular readers have probably noticed that I have particular interest in covering performances of the music of Johannes Brahms and have been given to writing at length about his compositions and, from time to time, his life.  Therefore, while I do not, as a rule, like to give advice on gifts for the season, I feel it worth pointing out that there are two excellent collections of Brahms' complete works on CD, even if Brahms never wrote anything that we would classify as "Christmas music."  At the going prices on Amazon.com, both of these collections are running at about the same price;  and both offer considerable "value for money" (which is the way I used to talk when I lived in Singapore)!  In terms of recording history, the older collection is the Complete Edition released by Deutsche Grammophon, which had its origins as a series of vinyl releases during the sesquicentennial celebration of Brahms' birth.  As I observed on my blog, the CD version is actually a "second edition" with minor alterations of the original vinyl project;  and, while I miss some of the original recordings that were replaced, I cannot fault any of the replacements.  The other collection is the Complete Works release by Brilliant Classics, which has been building up an impressive catalog of Gesamtwerk offerings.  In this case I used my blog to document many impressions of both the assets and liabilities of this collection.

Either collection provides an excellent opportunity to get to know the full scope of Brahms' compositional efforts.  As might be expected, the Deutsche Grammophon artists are likely to be more familiar than those encountered on the Brilliant recordings (all of which are "reprints," primarily from European sources);  but those who have never heard the Israeli wife-husband duo of Bracha Eden and Alexander Tamir will find their inclusion in the Brilliant collection to be most rewarding, particularly in their performance of the Opus 56b Haydn variations.  Part of the fun of serious listening is discovering new approaches introduced by previously unfamiliar performers.

Where both collections fall short is in providing useful written material.  All one finds in the Deutsche Grammophon booklet is a table of contents.  As is the case with all of the other Brilliant collections, all text resides only on a CD-ROM.  This is great if you have a computer (and, if you are reading this, you probably do);  and it means you can draw upon a search tool when you are trying to determine which CD has a specific composition.  However, the supplementary text is rather modest and does not compare with the printed material that accompanied the original Deutsche Grammophon vinyls.  With all the attention currently being given to scanning archival material, it would certainly be nice if Deutsche Grammophon mounted such a scanning project for their Brahms content.  It might even induce those searching for information about Brahms to purchase their CD offering!

Amazon.com browsers will quickly notice a significant difference in the number of CDs in these two packages.  There does not appear to be a problem of any difference in the actual content.  Since Brilliant is a "reprint" series, for the most part they simply reproduce what they have licensed.  Deutsche Grammophon, on the other hand, has done a relatively good job of "compacting" its sources.  Thus, while the Brilliant Collection takes 60 CDs (plus the CD-ROM), the Deutsche Grammophon package consists of 46.  However, since the prices of the two offerings are now so close and since the packages for both are relatively tight, that actual difference in CD count is not a major issue.  The bottom line, then, is that any choice between these two alternatives will come down to personal taste;  and either is likely to be received as an excellent gift idea by any serious listener!