# Imprint recordings and their influence on subsequent listening.



## Barbebleu (May 17, 2015)

Now when I say imprint recording what I mean is something that you heard for the first time and it had an impact on you that challenged your whole musical outlook. It may have made you look at a musical genre in a whole new light - my own personal experience or it made you listen to a particular composer or artist in a different way. 

My imprint recordings I fear may have coloured my whole experience of listening to those works subsequently and regardless of the work, for my part I will say the Solti Tannhäuser, I subconsciously compare the impact a new recording has on me compared to the impact of hearing Solti on me. I had never listened to opera before, far less Wagner and this was a turning point for me in my musical life. Through this experience I discovered Mahler, Richard Strauss, Mozart, Beethoven, Haydn et al. I discovered the great interpreters of their art, I discovered lieder, string quartets and a myriad of other joys without which my life would be exceedingly bereft. 

However I feel and have felt for a while that my excitement has diminished over the years and having listened to many versions of all my favourite works in those years I cannot say that I hear those works with the same unalloyed delight that I did when I first heard them.

When I listen to a new version of the Mahler 2 I can’t help but compare it to the first time I heard it on tv being played by Leonard Bernstein live. Of course at that time I didn’t know what or who I was listening to. All I knew was that it was a lightbulb moment for me and I couldn’t wait to hear more by this astonishing composer. Same for the first time I heard the presentation of the silver rose scene from Rosenkavalier ( Solti again!) that reduced me to tears and had me scampering to find out where that incredible music had come from and what else had he/she written.

My imprint Ring was the Solti and regardless of how good other conductors and orchestras are at doing this titanic work they never replace in my mind that initial impact. 

I still listen to different versions of Rosenkavalier but none of them ever repeat that same visceral and emotional impact of that first time.

Now it may be that it was the impact of the music that had the most powerful effect rather than the interpretation that I heard and that I would have had that if my imprint Tannhäuser had been say Sawallisch or my imprint Mahler had been Horenstein. Very possibly so but the fact remains that imprint recordings have affected my listening for the past fifty years and, in all likelihood, not in a positive way!

How about the rest of you?


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## Granate (Jun 25, 2016)

I don't know if anything like this has been debated beore in the forum. As I've been only 5 years seriously in the business, I could tell that at one time the Bruckner Karajan cycle in Berlin was my imprint recordings, but since I don't own it on cd and started buying others, the memory faded. So far, I don't think I really have an interpretation that has become my reference in Bruckner.

With Beethoven symphonies it has been different. I owned the Karajan Philharmonia cycle as the first cd set, and two years ago I listened to the most famous cycles, well, virtually half of all recorded (Merl has tried way more). I had some cycles I wanted to buy in stereo but I wasn't still very sure. In december 2018 I saw that I could buy the old Konwitschny cycle in Leipzig in the latest remaster for 13€ and decided to discard the completely different approach by JE Gardiner, or take the plunge to the exciting Immerseel. This choice would completely ruin the impression of all the fast-approached Beethoven cycles I knew and liked. I ended up falling in love with the Leipzig cycle to the point that I wouldn't really want to buy one of the spare DG No.9 by Fricsay or Karajan. Because I would still like the style and playing developed by Konwitschny.

The Toscanini Beethoven cycles were my favourite cycles in mono before this. With the pass of time and the influence of the set, I ended up falling for the particular approaches offered in live performances by Wilhelm Furtwängler and Otto Klemperer (stressing, live performances). It's the kind of universe I want to swim in even if I know the great results the HIP movement can deliver in Beethoven. 

On the other hand, little by little, the London Symphony Orchestra is becoming my referential orchestra for a couple of composers, because I liked their studio sets and I bought them first. I still haven't managed to escape from that sound when it comes to Dvorak or Sibelius. I may prefer the Karajan Vienna Dvorak 8 in Decca as a performance over the Rowicki in London, but the playing of the set draws me in. I cannot wait for the Dorati recordings with the same orchestra to be reissued. And as a matter of fact, I may fall to the LSO sound when I try Tchaikovsky symphonies. It's the same combination of analogue sound quality in Philips and this particular orchestra.


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## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

Imprinting is real - and the earlier you get imprinted the harder it is to shake it. The first Beethoven set I owned was the Leibowitz on Reader's Digest and I still all these 50+ years later compare new recordings to that well-worn and loved set. Same thing with Mahler. My first Mahler recordings were basically what ever I could get and afford. And to this day they are among my favorites even though I know better. From studying scores, carefully listening and just being more musical I realize that some of them have their weaknesses and are in many ways surpassed by later versions. But those first memories made a huge statement. It's tough to let go of favorites and harder to realize that what you thought was once so great maybe really isn't. That's another reason some collectors like myself buy so many recordings of the same work - to stir things up and not get stuck into only one performance. Keep the mind open. I suppose it's not unlike religion and politics: to change your mind and see other points of view, much less accept them, is a difficult thing for humans.


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

Depends totally on how good (or defensible) the imprint recording is. If I later hear a recording that is remarkably better (or different in a sort of way that I can judge to be "better"), the imprint recording gets superceded and I will bring it out (if at all) only for nostalgia's sake, or to confirm my impression as to its flaws. Some imprints were top notch to begin with and haven't needed to be dethroned.


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## larold (Jul 20, 2017)

An imprint can last forever ... and it may not. I started listening in the 1970s and still prefer some of the recordings I knew first to anything else I have heard in 50 years. 

An example for me are the Bach Orchestral Suites from Pablo Casals, one of the first recordings I knew. I started with that before there were any period recordings of the music, went through famous and not-so-famous recordings of it in the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s, and came back to it in my retirement last decade. I now own other recordings but still prefer it.

Yet other imprint recordings didn't have the same impact and many have been cast aside by newer or different recordings. Some imprint recordings simply fade over time, usually as the music itself becomes less fetching for one reason or another.

And some music never imprints. The first classical music I knew was Handel's Messiah that I sang in church and high school in the 1960s, then college in the 1970s, then with various choirs since that time. I have owned dozens of recordings of it of all styles. I used to buy a new one every year at Christmas. No single recording ever stuck with me.

One thing is certain: imprints only occur first, or when you are new to something. For whatever reason they indelibly imprint in your mind and psyche. But I don't think that can occur with any music that is particularly difficult. Having gotten through everything in the top 250 year ago I have no imprint for anything I have discovered this century, for example, and can be open to anything new or old. 

When I look at the recordings I know of something like the Berg Violin Concerto or his Chamber Concerto for Violin, Piano and 12 Wind Instruments, there is no imprint. I tend to like whatever one I have heard I like the best; it isn't usually the first I knew.

I don't think a piece of music that takes a lot of time and study to understand and enjoy -- such as some of the Mahler or Sibelius symphonies for me -- can immediately imprint the first time I hear it. I went through at least a half-dozen Sibelius 7th symphony recordings before I finally understood it and selected a recording as "the one."


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

My imprint recording for Rachmaninoff's Second Symphony was of the Pittsburgh Symphony under William Steinberg. The performance and interpretation were very good, although Steinberg somehow made the orchestration sound like Brahms, but there was a more serious problem: They performed the cut version and, as an ignorant teen, I had no idea anything was missing. It wasn't until I bought a score and did an analysis of the first movement as a final project for an analysis class that I realized something was amiss. Imagine my shock when listening with the score for the first time: "Hey, wait a second, what's all this extra fluff in here!" Turns out that in my imprint recording the scherzo was a five part rondo instead of a seven part rondo and the finale's recap was missing a similar repetition. To this day I can't listen to the uncut versions of these movements without feeling those "extra" repetitions as lethal momentum killers. Worse still, maybe, I am convinced that the uncut version really is that rarity in Rachmaninoff's oeuvre: a flabby, bloated structure.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

My mother used to play Beethoven sonatas, in particular Sonata no. 7 in D major Op. 10 No. 3; the second slow movement, Largo e mesto. Apparently she played it faster than is usual, because every version I have ever heard after that sounds way too slow. Anybody know of a fast recording of this?


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## Simplicissimus (Feb 3, 2020)

mbhaub said:


> Imprinting is real - and the earlier you get imprinted the harder it is to shake it. The first Beethoven set I owned was the Leibowitz on Reader's Digest and I still all these 50+ years later compare new recordings to that well-worn and loved set. Same thing with Mahler. My first Mahler recordings were basically what ever I could get and afford. And to this day they are among my favorites even though I know better. From studying scores, carefully listening and just being more musical I realize that some of them have their weaknesses and are in many ways surpassed by later versions. But those first memories made a huge statement. It's tough to let go of favorites and harder to realize that what you thought was once so great maybe really isn't. That's another reason some collectors like myself buy so many recordings of the same work - to stir things up and not get stuck into only one performance. Keep the mind open. I suppose it's not unlike religion and politics: to change your mind and see other points of view, much less accept them, is a difficult thing for humans.


Imprinting on recordings occurred for me only before the age of about 21. After that, I was exposed to more different recordings of genres of classical music that I hadn't listened to before. That, and I think a natural maturing of my brain such as makes learning languages and new sports more difficult after adolescence, seemed cut off the imprinting.

I grew up in a musical family and listened to classical music from as early as I can remember. My family had the 1958 Toscanini/NBC set of Beethoven symphonies, and starting in fifth grade I would listen to one or two movements a day, working my way through the set and then starting over from the beginning. Doing that for years definitely led to imprinting. When I was in eighth grade, I started listening a lot to the Reiner/CSO RCA Living Stereo recordings of Bartok's _Concerto for Orchestra_ and _Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta_. I was exceedingly pleased that I was able to enjoy dissonant music and considered myself a pretty cool and sophisticated guy. While in 10th grade, my dad bought me several Living Stereo albums of Rubinstein playing Chopin. I listened to those all the time for a couple of years and they imprinted. My final imprint was the 1975 Ormandy/Philadelphia recording of Holst's _The Planets_. Another music student who lived down the hall from me in my college dorm bought the album right after it was released and played it over and over every day for the rest of the year and it imprinted. Thereafter, I developed preferences for certain recordings but none really imprinted. I'm now at peace with the fact that the imprinted recordings will always sound best to me and preclude to some extent my enjoyment of other interpretations. I'm glad it's only these few recordings that have that status.


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

millionrainbows said:


> My mother used to play Beethoven sonatas, in particular Sonata no. 7 in D major Op. 10 No. 3; the second slow movement, Largo e mesto. Apparently she played it faster than is usual, because every version I have ever heard after that sounds way too slow. Anybody know of a fast recording of this?


This one by Kempf moves along pretty well - under 9 minutes:






- and Ashkenazy has a performance in his complete cycle that's under 10.

I also feel like many recordings tend to drag.


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## Art Rock (Nov 28, 2009)

Imprinting and Escaping the Imprint.


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## Coach G (Apr 22, 2020)

I think of what we're talking about more as a "frame of reference" as opposed to "imprinting".

I started with classical music as a teenager in the 1980s with LP recordings. As a high school student (later, a college student) with a part-time job, I relied heavily on Columbia and RCA reissues, so my first introductions to the basic classical music repertoire were a bunch of (by then) dead or elderly men such as Leonard Bernstein, George Szell, Bruno Walter, Leopold Stokowski, Isaac Stern, Rudolf Serkin, Zino Francescatti, Leonard Rose, Paul Fournier, Glenn Gould (playing for the Columbia team); and Aturo Toscanini, Charles Munch, Erich Liensdorf, Carl Reiner, Jascha Heifetz, and Artur Rubinstein (on the RCA team). I also had lots of Eugene Ormandy and Vladimir Horowitz, because during their long careers, each played for both Columbia and RCA at different times.

In this regard, the above mentioned luminaries from the Golden Age of classical recordings that were made between about 1950 and 1980 became my frame of reference and comparison.

Something of a departure happened in the early 2000s when I developed an interest in American composers via the NAXOS _American Composers_ series. All of the sudden I was getting to know a whole world of wonderful, interesting, and very diverse, American composers outside what major labels had to offer which was basically some Ives, Copland, Barber, Bernstein, and Gershwin with maybe one or two works by Walter Piston, William Schuman, or Alan Hovhaness thrown in every once in a while. So now I have a collection within a collection of American composers from Amy Beach and Edward MacDowall on down to living musicians such as John Corigliano, Adolphus Hailstork, Ellen Taaffe Zwilich, Jennifer Higdon, and many others. The pricing is modest and the recordings are made by musicians and orchestras that are less well-known but very good.


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## SONNET CLV (May 31, 2014)

I remain guilty of having retained a preference for a handful of works via the first recording (and hearing) of the work that I encountered. Off hand, among these I count the Max Rudolf/Cincinnati Symphony Bruckner 7th (Decca DL 710139), the Igor Markevitch/Royal Danish Orchestra Carl Nielsen Symphony No. 4 "The Inextinguishable" (Turnabout ‎- TV 34050S), and the George Szell/Cleveland Orchestra Dvořák Fifth Symphony "From the New World" (Epic ‎- BC 1026).





















My initial listening experience for each of these works (all on black vinyl discs) goes way back (as evidenced by the numbering of that Dvořák symphony) and I still have each of these albums in my collection, although none remains in what one would term "near mint" condition -- they've taken many a spin on my various turntables over the years.

A few other recordings I hold fall into the same category, but I've listened to thousands of discs over the years and can't say many have left the indelible imprint of these three (and the several others).

Oddly enough, I've collected quite a few Bruckner 7ths, Nielsen 4ths, and Dvořák 5ths (or 9ths, if you prefer) and find little wrong with any of them, overall, but I always compare these recordings to the "standards" (listed above), which remain so imprinted in my musical memory that escape seems impossible. (I recall one time in a live concert failing to join in with the standing ovation following a perfectly fine performance of "From the New World" because I became annoyed by the conductor's mishandling of a few bits and pieces here and there throughout the work that simply did not match up with my beloved Szell recording. Alas, my bad, of course.)

I suspect the imprinting has much to do with the age at which I first heard these seminal works, each of which made a deep initial impression upon me. And, the number of times I replayed the music till the notes embedded themselves into the fabric of my gray matter, or, more probably, into the ganglion threads of the reptilian portion of my brain.

I recall commenting on this Forum (some while back) that several seminal works (recordings of which I first encountered on LPs in my youth) failed to make much of any impression upon me then (and earned rankings as "least favorite works"), while later hearings of the same pieces (different recordings or concert hearings) struck impressionable chords (and propelled the pieces onto my "like this stuff" listing). In nearly every case, the initial recording that left the bad impression proved the work of one conductor, Herbert von Karajan, which likely explains my long time coolness towards his music-making. But it took me some while to actually figure this out. I had read much about certain listeners' complaints about Karajan releases (especially those of the Digital Age) but had not put one and one together till much later in my life, when I re-encountered with pleasing result works I had had a distaste for in my earlier years. I suspect we might term this a type of imprinting, too.

In any case, I don't find that imprinting has done me any particular long-term harm, so I really have no reason to comment on this thread.*

*Except, perhaps, to exercise my gray matter (or my remaining portion of reptilian brain) through word-smithery, as in the above passage in which I consciously strove to avoid use of "be" verbs (is, are, was, were, been). Reflecting on music serves a similar purpose.


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## Barbebleu (May 17, 2015)

Art Rock said:


> Imprinting and Escaping the Imprint.


Yeah, there are quite a lot of similar threads


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## realdealblues (Mar 3, 2010)

millionrainbows said:


> My mother used to play Beethoven sonatas, in particular Sonata no. 7 in D major Op. 10 No. 3; the second slow movement, Largo e mesto. Apparently she played it faster than is usual, because every version I have ever heard after that sounds way too slow. Anybody know of a fast recording of this?


Kovacevich maybe or Schiff?


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## JAS (Mar 6, 2013)

It is interesting that I am thinking about this phenomenon just this morning. I picked up a copy of the Szell set of Beethoven symphonies, based on a recommendation on another thread. Listening to the first CD (with symphony #1), my impression was that it was a bit stiff and formal, but as I went further on I tried to listen to it as if I did not already have preconceived notions of what it "should" sound like. It may not be possible to entirely shake an impression once it is well established, but perhaps we can minimize it somewhat if we are aware of the effect. There is, of course, also an admission that we might just prefer a particular interpretation over another. I know that there are examples where my preferred version of work is not the first that I heard.


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## jegreenwood (Dec 25, 2015)

JAS said:


> It is interesting that I am thinking about this phenomenon just this morning. I picked up a copy of the Szell set of Beethoven symphonies, based on a recommendation on another thread. Listening to the first CD (with symphony #1), my impression was that it was a bit stiff and formal, but as I went further on I tried to listen to it as if I did not already have preconceived notions of what it "should" sound like. It may not be possible to entirely shake an impression once it is well established, but perhaps we can minimize it somewhat if we are aware of the effect. There is, of course, also an admission that we might just prefer a particular interpretation over another. I know that there are examples where my preferred version of work is not the first that I heard.


On the other hand many of my imprint versions were Szell recordings, most notably Mozart and Schumann. I got his Beethoven cycle early on, but I believe Walter's stereo cycle was my first set. My dad had Walter's recording of the 7th, and the allegretto (more of an andante in his case) was not only my imprint version, but the first time I felt the beauty of classical music.


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## ribonucleic (Aug 20, 2014)

My imprint _Die Walküre_ was the 1987 James Levine studio recording. While I'm no longer as enamored of Jessye Norman's Sieglinde as I once was, when she unleashes her 16-inch guns on the climactic "Siegmund!", there's nothing to match it. I've also yet to hear a "Siegmund claims the sword" crescendo as majestically triumphant as Levine's.


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## Geoff48 (Aug 15, 2020)

My first memory is the Toscanini Barber of Seville overture on 78, the New York Version. Despite having heard countless versions since no one has ever equalled the transition into the second subject at the beginning of the second side. Also I still am surprised when the music continues without the need to turn the record over.
Another imprint is Friedman in the Grieg Concerto. Okay he may be like a bull in a china shop and Gaubert does little to restrain him but no one else makes so much of the work. Yes there are more accurate versions but early imprinting means that his is the one I always return to. Even over Lupu, Richter-Hauser, Curzon and countless others in my collection.


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## david johnson (Jun 25, 2007)

Imprints for me:
Bruckner 9/HVK/BPO
Beethoven 5/same
Also Sprach Zarathustra/Reiner/CSO
Scherazade/same
Shostakovich 5/Mitropoulos/NYPO


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## Merl (Jul 28, 2016)

As I said in the other imprinting thread, I have no problem with imprinting. I've largely moved on from many of my imprint accounts of repertoire. A few I still regard as essential, not because they were imprints but because they are brilliant (Macal's Dvorak 9, Sawallisch's, Schuman symphonies) but otherwise, many have long been left behind. By nature, I am not a conservative person. I also do not have a fixed mind so moving on is not a big deal for me. I embrace change and I'm always listening to new material hoping for a new gold standard.


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## annaw (May 4, 2019)

I feel my favourite recordings are the ones which become imprinted and maybe I do that at times even knowingly as they enable me to differentiate different recordings through comparing others with my imprints. I think Karajan’s style itself is somewhat my imprint. It’s very weird to be honest but I tend to prefer legato playing in both symphonic and chamber music.

In opera some specific interpretations have become to greater or lesser extent imprinted - Callas’ Norma, Hotter’s Wotan, DFD’s Wolfram, Stolze’s Walther (no joke, I love his phrasing), Björling’s Rodolfo etc. They have very distinctive voices which I have hard time forgetting when I listen to someone else sing the same roles.

With orchestral music I tend to have less imprinted recordings or at least they keep changing all the time, depending which ones I like the most. My orchestral imprinting usually happens thanks to specific tempi, phrasing, and whether the playing is legato or more staccato. Those are among the first things that catch my attention when I listen.


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## Barbebleu (May 17, 2015)

annaw said:


> I feel my favourite recordings are the ones which become imprinted and maybe I do that at times even knowingly as they enable me to differentiate different recordings through comparing others with my imprints. I think Karajan's style itself is somewhat my imprint. It's very weird to be honest but I tend to prefer legato playing in both symphonic and chamber music.
> 
> In opera some specific interpretations have become to greater or lesser extent imprinted - Callas' Norma, Hotter's Wotan, DFD's Wolfram, Stolze's Walther (no joke, I love his phrasing), Björling's Rodolfo etc. They have very distinctive voices which I have hard time forgetting when I listen to someone else sing the same roles.
> 
> With orchestral music I tend to have less imprinted recordings or at least they keep changing all the time, depending which ones I like the most. My orchestral imprinting usually happens thanks to specific tempi, phrasing, and whether the playing is legato or more staccato. Those are among the first things that catch my attention when I listen.


Thank goodness I'm not the only one who likes Stolze. He was my imprint Mime, Herod and Aegisthus. I do like distinctive voices.


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## annaw (May 4, 2019)

Barbebleu said:


> Thank goodness I'm not the only one who likes Stolze. He was my imprint Mime, Herod and Aegisthus. I do like distinctive voices.


Haha. His Walther in _Tannhäuser_ finally converted me. He was a wonderful character tenor!


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## Allegro Con Brio (Jan 3, 2020)

I have only ever heard one complete Ring - the Solti - but when Mime first entered in _Siegfried_ I burst out laughing and couldn't stop as long as he was singing. I thought that it was the most perfect vocal characterization ever; I couldn't decide whether it was hilarious or disturbing.


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## Holden4th (Jul 14, 2017)

This is a great thread.

As a teenager, pianist and music lover I started collecting LPs in the mid to late 60s. World Record Club was my budget path to some great recordings. A small number imprinted, most because they were great recordings. Gilels/Ludwig PC 4 is still my favourite. John Fields Nocturnes played by Noel Lee have yet to be surpassed. What a pity they aren't on CD. My first LvB symphony cycle was Cluytens - not too bad for a first choice. I collected the EMI Barenboim sonata cycle and LP at a time.

Then CDs came along and everything changed. I could walk into a store, ask to demo CDs and it wasn't a problem. I'd also gone down the media path with a yearly subscription to Gramophone Magazine. The Cluytens LvB set still wasn't digitised so I sought out what I could find with other conductors - enter Bruno Walter.

So where am I now? Most of the imprints are gone. Just the other day I elevated Lennies NYPO Eroica over my Leibowitz. The Gilels/Ludwig LvB PC4 is still top of the list (closely followed by a Moravec performance with an obscure US conductor and orchestra). The bottom line is I know what my preferences are for composers but I'm prepared to be swayed. The imprinting has gone because I've listened to so many other performances.


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## MatthewWeflen (Jan 24, 2019)

Presumably the imprint will be as strong as the performance. My first CM deep dive was a Karajan box set. There are imprints from this box I haven't shaken (Beethoven, Strauss, Brahms, and Bruckner), and those I have (Bach, Mozart).


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

In my case, imprinting is far more of a factor in concertos than in other genres. So my preferences in many such were set early, but I am fortunate that, in most cases, the LP faves of my youth have been preserved on CD. Some examples:

Brahms PC2: Richter/Leinsdorf
Ravel, both concertos: François/Cluytens
Rachmaninoff PC2&3: Janis/Dorati
Sibelius VC: Heifetz/Hendl
Prokofiev PC3: Cliburn/Hendl

I've managed to adapt to other performances of other works that were imprinted on me early on, but the above were such old friends that it would pain me to let them go.


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## Holden4th (Jul 14, 2017)

Strange Magic said:


> In my case, imprinting is far more of a factor in concertos than in other genres. So my preferences in many such were set early, but I am fortunate that, in most cases, the LP faves of my youth have been preserved on CD. Some examples:
> 
> *Brahms PC2: Richter/Leinsdorf*
> Ravel, both concertos: François/Cluytens
> ...


A performance I came to later in my listening and which is now a firm favourite.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

I think the imprint I remember were the first real classical discourse I bought which were Tchaikovsky‘s first piano Concerto played by Julius Katchen and Handel’s Water Music plated by Boyd Neel Orchestra. I was only a lad at the time but they convinced me that the great joys of music lay with classical. Perhaps two others were Beethoven six symphony with the Minnesota orchestra and then Serkin playing the 2and 4 piano concertos. Of course since then I’ve listened to dozens and dozens of recordings but the stick in the mind


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