Title: terrible recording; aggressive playing
Review: Maxim, how can you let the recordists do this to you?Among the reasons for classical music's decline is how it is recorded - multi-miked tracks destined for assembly at a mixing board. Listening to several of Vengerov's recordings with orchestra, his steely, over-close sound can be forgiven as a recording artifact. (The Britten and Walton are not too bad). One can attribute the lack of individuality of playing and of sound to the recording style.But what is one to make of his solo recital album? How can a solo violin be made to sound like the Wehrmacht in full force? The sound is ten feet tall and hard as nails. Has any violin sounded like this in real life? The recording is extremely close, and then drowned in phony ambience to make it sound like it is actually somewhere -- in the abstract halls of heaven.
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