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MauritiusToday.com - Shopping Mall - Bach: The Four Great Toccatas and Fugues [SACD]
![Bach: The Four Great Toccatas and Fugues [SACD]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/5192DANX0DL._SL160_.jpg)
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List Price: $18.97
Our Price: $14.99
Your Save: $ 3.98 ( 21% )
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Manufacturer: Sony
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Audio CD
EAN: 0696998798366
Format: SACD
Label: Sony
Manufacturer: Sony
Number Of Discs: 1
Publisher: Sony
Release Date: 2003-04-01
Studio: Sony
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: A special thanks to RCA Records
Comment: As a child in the 1970's, I remember the day that my father brought home the LP version of this album. It was one of a few quadraphonic albums that I know of ever made.
Regardless of the fact that it was intended for a quadraphonic stereo system, RCA Records had the courtesy to make the album compatible with standard, stereo systems. You wouldn't get the 4-speaker surround effect they intended, but you could still hear every sound on the recording.
Contrast that with today's Sony Music and the SACD format. Unfortunately, this Bach disk doesn't play on standard CD systems.
It might be said that Japanese car makers won the American consumer, thanks to the 1970's. But not so with the recording industry. The American recording industry in the 21st century has shown a lot more courtesy than Japan has to the average schmoe like me.
Regretably, I won't be shelling out for an SACD player to hear this incredible album. Thankfully, my dad converted the LP to CD, and I'm able to hear this on my Ipod now; with all the hisses and pops of LP. No thanks to Sony Music.
I give this album 2 stars because I know the content is 5-star-plus. It's just not playable for the time being.
I'd also like to thank Amazon for refunding my purchase of the SACD. Since their return policy applies to CD's, the SACD is arguably returnable, even if the packaging is opened. Amazon honored my return request.
Customer Rating:
Summary: As If In The Cathedral Of Freiburg!
Comment: Johann Sebastian Bach's four great Toccatas and Fugues are some of the most dramatic and vivid of his organ works. This recording was made in the Cathedral of Freiburg, Germany with four new organs; a Marien, a Choir, a Nave and a Gallery Organ "St. Michael". All these were played through a central console in the original Cathedral. The sound was recorded in `quadraphonic', but it is released on this SACD in true 5.1 surround sound, meaning there is a central front speaker and the subwoofer. The experience is that of being in the cathedral and feeling and hearing all the sounds and vibrations of these incredible machines. Bach's Toccatas and Fugues are some of the most amazing compositions and to hear them in this format is thrilling. Originally recorded in 1973 in `quadraphonic', the entire recording was remastered into SACD 5.1 surround sound. If you have the system, this is the ultimate recording to listen to. If you don't have an SACD system, you must at least hear this phenomenon somewhere.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Heavenly Immersion
Comment: If you are looking for THE multi-channel SACD to blow your mind (and your friend's collective minds) and prove the potential of this format - this is the one. Of course it helps if you like, or have the potential of liking, Bach's organ music.
It's unfortunate that the one-star reviews here pulled the average down. Unfortunate because the only criticism is that these people have is that don't have mutli-channel SACD playback equipment. This is not a valid criticism of the actual contents - only a reflection that they didn't pay attention to what was on the screen when ordering the disk.
If you have the right gear - get ready to put your subwoof through its paces!
Customer Rating:
Summary: Best SA-CD I own
Comment: If your AV system is capable of taking advantage of SA-CD then you OWE it to yourself to purchase this disc - the sound is just that amazing. Many have said this before me, but this is a recording of four organs being played at once in a large church, and you can hear EVERYTHING. Every note is super clear. You can hear the echo when the organ releases every note. You can even hear the organ changing ranks when the organist changes stops. If you close your eyes it seriously feels like you are in a large church listening to four organs which are 100 feet away.
In short, if you have ears that work, and an A/V system capable of playing SA-CD (this will not work in a normal CD player) then you will appreciate this and you must own it.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Good Fun
Comment: This is a fun recording and the remastered SACD sound is really outstanding. It's a shame that the excellence of recordings like this weren't successful in making SACD a mainstream medium. Now that major labels have curtailed support of SACD, this advance in home reproduction has been pretty much relegated to the specialty market.
Biggs interpretations of these chestnuts are very similar to his versions performed on the Flentrop organ at Harvard - allowing for the batting around of the music made possible by the four instruments employed. This is an older style of Bach playing, solid (I almost wrote stolid) in tempo and unconcerned with with recent scholarship on things like period-inspired fingering and pedaling. Registrations are colorfully varied (obviously) and minimal cadential ornamentation is employed. The electric action that is used for simultaneous playing of the four organs, three of which are also played by tracker action, also effects the interpretations.
Biggs was a good musician as well as a showman. Everything here is tasteful, unlike his odd recordings of Joplin rags on the pedal harpsichord that are roughly contemporary with these sessions. Interestingly Biggs made a swipe at the electronics which made the central console at Freiburg possible in his LP "The Organ in Sight and Sound." Electricity is, he stated, suitable for "operating a doorbell" but not for the playing action of a muscial instrument. (He was a strong advocate of tracker action in Bach and other other eighteenth century organ music. You have to wonder just what he thought of these efforts.
Sadly, we'll probably never hear the other music recorded in these sessions - I remember some Handel and other pieces treated to the same antiphonal treatment on LP - with Sony's withdrawal from the SACD medium. If you have the equipment, buy this. You won't be disappointed.
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