maxg Posted February 9, 2004 Share Posted February 9, 2004 I got jealous of GFH's SACD post and wanted to produce a similar thing for vinyl. Obviously this is not realy going to be possible as the numbers of albums out there is so enormous compared to SACD. However, it did stimulate me to start tackling my problem of sifting through my vinyl. AS I had some time free over the weekend I started the process. Lots of problems - even to decide how to sort the albums - settled on alphabetical based on the name of the composer of the piece on side one, track one (those darned mixed albums with 2 or more composers on a single disk). - Anyone else with a different, maybe better system please chime in. I have had to separate out the box sets - which I will catalog at the end - and these now occupy a 4th growing line of albums in the living room (wife not noticed yet...). Anyway, having sorted the albums I started the process of putting them onto a spreadsheet database. Things are rather worse than I figured numberwise. I got "B" onto the computer - 48 titles in all - nightmare! That nightmare comprises 2 parts - one is how many records I now actually have and two is that I can see a list a mile long of the things I want - and we are only on the letter B!!! Bear in mind - I dont own any composer beginning with A and we have not included the "B" sides of albums with other composers first (for example on one of my 1812 overture editions Beethoven's Wellington's victory lurks awaiting). Also excluded are the box sets for now, as I said above: Just for reference - as follows: 1 Bach Concertos for harpsichord 1 4 5 2 Bach Cantatas 26 61 130 3 Bach / Froberger / Fischer Cembalomusik 4 Bach Violin Concerto 5 Bach Cantatas 57 140 6 Bach / Vivaldi Violin Concerto D minor / Concerto Grosso 7 Bach Weihnachtsoratorium 8 Bach Tocatta and Fugue 9 Bach Brandenburg Concertos 1 2 3 10 Bach Brandenburg Concertos 4 5 6 11 Batiato Gilgamesh 12 Bartok Concerto for Orchestra 13 Beethoven Fidelio Highlights 14 Beethoven Piano Sonatas 8,14,23 15 Beethoven Quartet 16 / Grosse Fuge 16 Beethoven Quartet in D+ / Quartet in C- 17 Beethoven Overtures Leonore Egmont Coriolan Fidelio 18 Beethoven Piano Concerto No. 2 19 Beethoven Fur Elise 20 Beethoven Serenade Op 8 21 Beethoven Piano Concerto 5 22 Beethoven Piano Concerto 5 23 Beethoven Piano Concerto 5 24 Beethoven Violin Concerto in D 25 Beethoven Symphony 1 and 8 26 Beethoven Symphony 2 and 4 27 Beethoven Symphony 3 28 Beethoven Symphony 3 29 Beethoven Symphony 2 and 4 30 Beethoven Symphony 5 31 Beethoven Symphony 6 32 Beethoven Symphony 7 33 Beethoven Symphony 5 and 8 34 Beethoven Symphony 9 35 Berlioz Te Deum 36 Berlioz Romeo and Juliette 37 Berlioz Symphony Fantastic 38 Bizet / Prokofiev / Dukas Symphony in C / Classical Symphony / Sorcerers Apprentice 39 Brahms German Requiem 40 Brahms Piano Concerto 2 41 Brahms Symphony 4 42 Brahms Symphony 1 43 Brahms Tragic Overture 44 Brahms Violin Concerto 45 Bruchner Symphony 7 46 Bruchner Symphony 4 47 Bruchner Symphony 6 48 Bruchner Symphony 9 This is going to take some time. Until I have finished it I will not be able to make my proposed recommendations list, so wish me luck (if you are interested in the aforementioned list that is). I should add that this is not the full amount of information I am entering for each album. There just isnt the space on here for the full details which are as follows: Number Composer Title Performer not applicable to symphonies - soloists. Orchestra Conductor Producer Not the right term - DECCA, Philips et al. Number The only real unique identifier S/M Stereo or mono (no quads - yet) Country Disks number of records Notes Special versions usually - or anything that springs to mind about an individual title. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Parrot Posted February 9, 2004 Share Posted February 9, 2004 Max, "A" composers are tough. My only one is John Adams. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
garymd Posted February 9, 2004 Share Posted February 9, 2004 Holy cow Max. My sorting was easy in comparison. I have about 1200 but 80% were of the rock variety so alphabetizing was easy. My section for classical was so small I just put my favorites together (about 8) and the rest in no particular order. The whole process took about 10 hours. Good luck my friend! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maxg Posted February 9, 2004 Author Share Posted February 9, 2004 LOL - no A's for me Paul - but as you say there aren't that many. Gary - I am not touching the Rock stuff - that is all over the place now. All I have done is separate out those that I listen to at all regularly and keep the rest in piles hidden whenver possible. Actually I dont expect thigns to carry on this way. B seems to be a common starter for classical composers - there are a lot less of most letters (although S looks like a bugger too). I also noticed that Britten is missing - although I have a few of his - I wonder if they are all B sides or if I have screwed up again.... I should have done this as I bought them!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LarryC Posted February 9, 2004 Share Posted February 9, 2004 Max, This probably only works for me, but because I tend to remember my LPs by brand, I sort mine by brand first (DG, Angel, etc.), and then alphabetize by composer. It makes my collection a whole lot more managable. As you said, alphabetizing an LP is a problem with multiple composers, so the best I can do is alphabetize the composer of the work I'm most interested in. I also have a section with a lot of miscellaneous brands, alpha by composer. I still have to hunt for small brandname contingents like Vanguards! Larry Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sheltie dave Posted February 9, 2004 Share Posted February 9, 2004 I wish I managed to retain all the music I had gathered as a youngan. I have close to all the equipment that I dreamed of having, but all my vinyl friends are gone. I had over 1500 albums in the day, and I played DJ at rock, country, classical, and esoteric radio stations in St. Louis without having to spin anything outside my collection. It was fun to look at sections, and reflect that the Can, Randy Pie, Synergy, Tangerine Dream, Kraftwerk, Gentle Giant, Caravan, Hawkwind, La Dusseldorf, and Camel lps were purchased second semester of sophomore year when a friend came back from Chicago raving about some of the European stuff he had picked up. I could chart all the musical phases I went through by additions to the stash. It was a very comforting ritual. Select the album, carefully remove the sleeve, slide the album out and put on the platter. Pull out the discwasher, fire up the table, clean and brush the album. Girls knew they were on good terms with us when we actually would let them play an album. These "modern" CDs don't cut the mustard for capturing the mystique and feel of good wax. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Parrot Posted February 9, 2004 Share Posted February 9, 2004 One day my amazing friend sorted his several thousand classical LPs by birth date of the composer. BY MEMORY, without looking at the dates. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maxg Posted February 9, 2004 Author Share Posted February 9, 2004 Paul, Now that is showing off. I wonder if he got them all right? Impressive all the same. I had thought of arranging them by genre first (classical, romantic etc.) andt hen alphabetically but there are several I regard as cross-over composers who started with one style and finished with the next. As for sorting them by Label - I would never find a damn thing if I did that - every time I convince myself a given work in the collection is on one label it turns out it is on another. Hell - I was convinced I had Brahms Requiem in a previous thread only to discover I had confused it with Berlioz Requiem (which - as it happens I prefer). (and before you notice that the Berlioz is not listed it is a box set which will be done at the end). Talking of box sets I noticed the other day that the middle record of my Rigoletto is missing. Cant tell you how disappointed I was. Thankfully "La Donne et Mobile" is on side 5 or I would have fallen on my sword. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ben. Posted February 9, 2004 Share Posted February 9, 2004 Max- Great topic. I'd been toying with this issue myself. Every time I find myself in front of the shelves looking around like an old lady in the pantyhose section, I wonder what the best way to organize would be. As far as shelf organization, I merely go by Artist (for Jazz/Pop) or Composer (Legit). Any compilations go in their own section (multi-artist movie soundtracks live here, too, along with novelty stuff). A third section contains spoken word LPs (Cosby was a genius!). My stumbling block is that I'd like to put this all on a spread sheet. I don't mind spending the time to do it, because I would spend much less time standing in front of the stacks like said pantyhose shopper. Also, I might play a bit more white-jacket and ratty-jacket discs. What I'd like is to able to have a auto-sortable file, like when you do a search at an e-commerce site. If you click on a certain heading (say, Price or Availibilty), the list will re-sort itself. Click again, and it will reverse the order. Can this be done in Excel? How about a PDA? I might be convinced to finally buy a PDA just for this. Or, for the really perverse, how about sorting by Library of Congress catalog #? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
garymd Posted February 9, 2004 Share Posted February 9, 2004 Just when I get things in order, I go to the thrift shop and buy another 30 or so lps today. They were priced at $1.75 each but the guy told me if I bought more than 10, he'd give them to me for $25 total. Somebody must have just dropped off their colletion (the stack in plastic covers - always a good sign) because I scored some great lps. When was the last time you found a NM copy of Woodstock! I did pass on the really nice Pioneer SX-750 for $30 though. Now I have to figure out how to fit these in. I'm pretty maxed out on shelf space. I think I'll have to add another shelf. BTW - Still no takers on the Anita Bryant collection? Only 1 person showed interest so all the Gene Pitneys are spoken for. Many great Jim Nabors/Ray Coniff Singers/Don Ho/Wayne Newton, and so on remain. Please don't tell me you want the "and so on" lps. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maxg Posted February 9, 2004 Author Share Posted February 9, 2004 BC, That is exactly what I am working on now. I sync my handheld with the PC each day and so far we are fine (but the volumes are small). Yes sorting is fully possible in the ssheet - but I am yet to try it on the handheld (I am not sure it fully understands databases in reality). For my needs it should be more than sufficient. I am quite happy to browse down to the composers name to see if I have a given copy of a record. There is almost certainly a search function for the sheet - but again I have not tried it. If all goes well I will post the ssheet and full instructions as to what I do so you can compare to you own needs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
synthfreek Posted February 9, 2004 Share Posted February 9, 2004 I'm surprised no one has mentioned the classic scene in High Fidelity where John Cusack's character is sorting his albums by relationship! I got this one when I was with Suzie... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maxg Posted February 10, 2004 Author Share Posted February 10, 2004 Synth, It did spring to mind whilst I was sorting. I loved that film - had me in stitches. Fair progress last night - I got up to Dvorak (very few C's - actually just Chopin) and then Debussy, Delius and Dvorak. I am feeling a bit more confident about the process now - this may not take nearly as long as I had feared. On the other hand I am sure I had a Corelli knocking around somewhere - where the hell has that gone (could be on the back of something else I suppose)? I also have Dukas - but that is definitely on the back of something else - ha found it - Bizet, Prokofiev and Dukas - already filed!! System is working!!! Yippee. This promises to be like having the Encyclopedia Britanica in my palm!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Parrot Posted February 10, 2004 Share Posted February 10, 2004 Goodwill scrounging was fine today. I spent all of $7 and added another couple dozen of LPs to my collection. I was really pleased to find a Dinu Lipatti recording of Chopin. Lipatti was one of the great great pianists, dead at 33. Other notable ones: Pablo Casals conducting Isaac Stern playing Bach Guiomar Novaes, another excellent pianist, playing Chopin Saint-Saens playing his own work on the piano Brahms Sym 2/Toscanini Brahms Sym 3/Reiner On the Philips label: Beethoven Emperor Concerto Rossini Overtures/Marriner-Academy of St Martin Handel Watermusic and Mahler 3/Horenstein-London S O Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dubai2000 Posted February 10, 2004 Share Posted February 10, 2004 When starting collecting recorded music (obviously in vinyl only days) I began arranging LPs in alphabetical order. If a record included two diffrent composers (say Elgar/Delius Cello Concertos) I usually listened to one more often than the other - hence this recording went to 'E'. I started the same with my CDs, but somehow never managed to include those which contain off air recordings, so my shelves in the hallway are kind of disorganized, but when searching for a particular CD one might encounter some unexpected treasure . But it beat me completely to get all recordings noted on the computer - simply too many and without a handheld decive this is really a pain...you know where! Perhaps one day though I'll follow Max's example.... Wolfram Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.