Past gurlhood music

Music it has to be said played an important part in my life and especially through my childhood whither or not it's what we call popular or what is usually classified as classical. 
Music has this amazing ability to transmit emotions, stimulate the mind as well as taking us on epic journeys of discovery.

Music in connection with readings ties in with me for Christmas which always meant which Carols from Kings loving to hear the young boy choristers sing.

This was an early cd I bought because it contains the readings I grew up with as a boy and the beautiful sang carols.
 
Sometimes music is an end in itself such as such as recital or rock concert, it may the accompaniment of a dance as many Waltzes were intend to or an integral part in a grand production such as stage show, opera or ballet together with other artistic disciplines.

Music has a lot to offer people especially children and thoughtful educators have always tried to introduce not just musical concepts as harmony, melody, time etc as well but encouraging children to play an instrument themselves as well as in ensembles.

At my primary school I played the xylophone, glockenspiel, triangle as well as tambourine in school productions, assemblies and we had separate music classes during the week to learn new pieces of music as well as develop our abilities which for some of was a challenge!

One of the first prices of classical music I heard was Rimsky Korsakov's Scheherazade  an epic tale based on the book of 1000  and one nights (aka The Arabian Nights) told in rich symphonic sound with a wonderful role the Violin when I was just over nine years of age when my teacher decided to play it for us.

It wasn't long before I was pestering daddy for a copy of this on lp record as by that point I'd got a stereo record player of my own.

In 1992 I bought the newly remastered cd version of it on Classics for Pleasure, loving Hugh Bean's solo violin part.

Fortunately here in the UK there were and still are many classical music programs on the radio that give you the opportunity to explore works you may be unfamiliar with and through them I learned about people like Beethoven, Chopin and Berlioz among others and their music.

As well in time I started to build my own library of recordings such as the Beethoven Symphonies in my teens that I write about yesterday.

I also had recordings of Tchaikovsky ballets at the time - he was a way with musical characterizations like Puss and Boots in the third act of  Sleeping Beauty and I adore the entire Nutcracker suite.

So you could say my classical music collection originally started on ye olde lp record and for a brief period went to cassettes as their quality improved in the early 1980's.
The first classical cd I bought was one of Sibelius's tone poems by the Berlin Philharmonic followed by  Lalo Espagnole Symphonie disc in 1986.

I had a mania for Violin music and was lucky to get the two lp box set of Paganini's First Violin Concerto and 24 Caprices as performed by Itzhak Perlman on British  HMV with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Laurence Foster replacing them on cd eventually.

Those copies were Japanese pressed editions from 1985 when Emi belatedly decided to make recordings available in the new cd format.

I developed a love of the music of the Strauss family, wheelchair dancing to waltzes and aided by the annual Vienna New Years Day concert broadcast on BBC Radio Three at the time I tuned into religiously.

I recently bought this six cd box set of the man to which his performances of them were what I listened to in that era Willi Boskovsky recorded in the late 60's and early 70's with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra.

They pretty much contain every performance I heard from the borrowed records and tapes I had then, all remastered from the original analogue stereo tapes arranged by composition type originally released by Decca over here.

Fortunately compared to the early days of compact discs such sets are fairly inexpensive having serviceable booklets about the music.