Starting a vinyl collection – is it worth it for classical music?

[Black Stuart]

Bob - that's called - stating the obvious.

[G Willis]

I can answer my own question now, since I did indeed start a vinyl collection - classical, Jazz and Rock.

It has been quite a long and evolving journey which started with an impulse buy – a Lenco 75 spotted in a second hand electronics shop on the Gloucester Road in Bristol. This sat under a chest of draws for a a few months before I started to play with it; I made a heavy birch-ply plinth for it, built the WD-Phono3, got a RB-330 tonearm from Ebay, and picked up an ex-demo Ortofon Cadenza Red.

This had already started to cost some serious money, nonetheless the result was instantly enjoyable, it sounded immediate and had a tangible quality that was somehow lacking from my DAC. The first record I played was a jazz concert recording and the music and atmosphere of the gig flooded into the room in a way that was nothing quite like I had heard from my DAC.

Nonetheless, there was no getting away from the fact it has some serious deficiencies; the sound was unfocused, big brushstrokes, over saturated and lacking in finesse and transparency. So next came a new arm, an Origin Live which immediately bought a focus and precision to the sound - the image snapped into place and everything became tighter. I was still unhappy with the Lenco I had built; the sound got congested on dynamic music and lacked depth.

Enter the Garrard – sold to be at a very fair price by Greg of these forums. This is a very nice 401 in a welsh blue slate plinth and from the outset sounded really great, it has a powerful and authoritative sound. It was further improved by, er, actually setting it up correctly, and by the addition of a second lower slate plinth to replace the wooden section.

In response to the idler-skeptics, there is very little noise from this deck – on a good pressing it is has an almost silent background and winding the volume up so amplification noise becomes audible any motor noise from the deck is completely obscured.

I have also rebuilt the phono3 because...lets just say my soldering skills have moved on. I fitted mundorf gold-silver-oils, charcroft, takman and mills resistors and changed the SUT ratios to 10:1. I also changed the power cap to a mylitic. This is all still burning in a bit but a greater transparency, clarity and depth is now being heard. The overall tonal balance has now been slightly lightened and in my opinion is more accurate.

So at this point in time I almost always prefer to listen to vinyl. It can convey the sense of space and realism in a performance as just well as, often better than the DAC but its also somehow more enjoyable. There are things the DAC can do better, perhaps clarity on very big orchestral climaxes being the most notable. Also of course choice of new music on LP is somewhat limited, this though has its benefits – with a smaller music collection I can know it better. Then there are the well known irritations of vinyl; bad pressings, scratches, long pieces broken across two sides, 35 minutes squeezed on to one side, and my personal favourite – not being able to extract the record from the inner sleeve.

So, no regrets for me a very enjoyable and worthwhile journey although I must admit I have avoided calculating the cost of it all.

[Greg.]

Good outcome. Looking forward to another listen after all your hard work

[G Willis]

There is probably one other point worth mentioning, especially in regard to classical music, and that is that many of the really great and famous recordings made in the so called golden age of the LP – the 50s, 60s, 70s and 80s have mysteriously suffered from awful transfers to CD. I don’t understand why this should be but these same recordings in the analogue realm can sound truly magical.

[vinylspinner]

You will have to join Greg on a visit to my place. I have well over 2000 classical albums in my collection that I intend to start thinning out.

Nigel

Originally Posted by G Willis

There is probably one other point worth mentioning, especially in regard to classical music, and that is that many of the really great and famous recordings made in the so called golden age of the LP – the 50s, 60s, 70s and 80s have mysteriously suffered from awful transfers to CD. I don’t understand why this should be but these same recordings in the analogue realm can sound truly magical.

[G Willis]

Nigel,

Thanks, I'd like to. Be very interested.

Cheers, Graham

[Greg.]

We’ll have to set up a date. Let me know your availability and I’ll see what can be organised. Generally, Fridays are best.

[bob orbell]

I used to look forward to Friday when I was at work, we finished at mid day and it was known as POETS day, **** of early tomorrows Saturday . Bob