Reissue heaven

Man, has EMI gone nuts as of late. This month, five "References" titles were released in the States (though it looks like they are from last year for Europe), all of them worth buying. There are Gieseking's traversal of all of Ravel's solo piano music, Edwin Fischer doing Beethoven's Emporer (with Furtwangler) and a couple sonatas, Menuhin (with Furtwangler again) doing Bartok's Second Violin Concerto and Solo Violin Sonata, Cantelli directing some favorite symphonies, and the Quartetto Italiano doing the Ravel, Debussy, and Milhaud thing.

I already bought the Gieseking and Fischer, and both are superb. The Gieseking now sits happily with my Casadesus set. The Fischer is very good, if better version of each work are available. The Emporer is fine, the orchestral playing especially, but the piano playing is somewhat light and technically flawed. As technical perfection is not a trait I associate with Edwin Fischer, I found the performance quite nice. It won't displace Pollini or Schnabel, though. Strangely enough, the Op 57 sonata on the disc fares very well, despite the technical failings; it is one of my favorite versions. That other Fischer - Annie - still takes top honors in this work.

I can't wait to get the other titles.

But there is more. EMI is also set to release John Ogdon playing Shostakovich's Second Piano Concerto along with Bartok's Third. Cziffra will be represented with a Chopin disc and a five disc set of Liszt(!) - all discs I do not have. And even mighty Warner gets into the act with four Michelangeli discs to be released later. I better start saving my pennies. (All of you more experienced collectors may have many of these titles, but I am salivating. I wonder what DG is up to?)