# The Penguin Guide - Your recollections.



## Merl

For many of us of a certain vintage the Penguin Guide was THE BIBLE of classical music due to the fact we had nothing else that helped sum up the plethora of classical music out there (pre-internet). I can't remember when I got my first one (think it was around the mid 80s) but I do remember reading through it and checking out the 'rosette' recordings, in particular.

So why bring this up? Well two reasons - firstly, whilst sorting out the loft a few weeks back I discovered a copy of the Penguin Guide for CDs (pics below - apologies for its condition, it's had a hard life) and started to read it. Then, today, a few members were discussing it on the Current Listening thread so I thought why not put up a thread about it.

So what are your recollections of the Penguin Guide? Did you have any of them? Did you like it? Did you fish through the book looking for the 'rosette' recordings and try to collect them? Did you hate it? Go for it!


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## Handelian

I still have a copy - one of the last editions. It was very good as long as you realised it was opinions. It provided a guide to the more middle of the road line of critical opinion.


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## Guest002

All I remember is checking that _Peter Grimes_ had indeed got a Rosette (good on you, John Culshaw!)

Are there any statistics on it: such as when it went out of print? I see your copy (I hope you're suitably shamed!!) mentions the 1990s. In the '80s, I had little money and less musical taste: it was Britten time or nothing, so I didn't really need it (except to confirm that my purchases were Rosette-worthy). In the 1990s, I moved to Australia and had even less money and had no means to build up my music collection further for a good few years. So on both sides of that divide, I kind of missed out on the whole thing.

I do remember in around 2007 wondering whether a particular recording was any good, and thinking 'Oh, I need to get hold of a Penguin guide', and discovering at that point, to my horror, that it wasn't produced any more. Which surprised me at the time -but looking back at it, the fragmentation of the music market probably made it inevitable.


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## HenryPenfold

I took my first Penguin Guide sometime in the late 1980s. Whilst not my Bible (I'm an antitheist, anyway) it was a superb _vade mecum. _I always pre-ordered a hard-back copy, so I was always up to date! It really helped me discover new composers that I wasn't aware of (Messiaen and Telemann spring to mind), or to identify recordings of composers that I'd otherwise discovered (Robert Simpson a notable example).

I quickly realised that the Rosette did not always meet my experience, but the designation was hard to ignore!

They did end up taking up a fair bit of room and they were heavy. So in a house move several years ago, I chucked them all out. I don't regret it, although I do wish I'd kept one back for the sake of nostalgia.

Spending a couple of hours an evening leafing through the guides was quite a pleasure, especially given that much of what I was reading about was mainly new to me. Although not verbatim, I think I can remember a good many of the reviews!


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## Merl

^ I had to look 'vade mecum' up. It sounded like an illness.


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## starthrower

I can't speak for their classical reviews. I have one of their jazz guides and I found the writers to be rather pompous. They dismissed some of my favorite records while praising to the hilt a number of British jazzers. And there is some great British jazz, but it ain't Miles, Monk, or Ellington.


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## haziz

I first encountered it in the early 90s, after moving to the US. The local Tower records, in a New York suburb, which had a sizeable classical music section usually had a couple of dog-eared "store copies", labelled as such, and the occasional Gramophone guide, that they would let you borrow as you perused the aisles. It certainly was good for business, as far as the store was concerned. I soon afterwards acquired my own copy, and generally bought each newer edition as they came out. Initially, cash strapped, I focused on the highly ranked "budget" selections, and yes, did try and amass the ones earning rosettes, even sometimes splurging on a full price (US$15-18!) disc if it was in a genre, or of a composer I liked, although at that time I usually just lusted after the more expensive recommendations. It was apparent, soon afterwards, that this was the opinion of the editors, and I did not always agree, however it was certainly a useful guide. Over the years I ultimately did amass a massive collection since then, most of which is now sitting gathering dust, as I have find myself getting lazier and lazier and relying on high bit rate streaming serives (e.g. Tidal Master and Qobuz). 

Now with a massive collection of physical CDs, and an even more massive selection from the online streaming services, I still find myself preferring the sound of many of my initial purchases, most often based on the Penguin guide, and to a lesser extent Gramophone guide, since I probably imprinted on the sound and performance style. So, to this day, I find myself often preferring Markevitch's LSO recordings of the Tchaikovsky symphonies, or Kertesz's Dvorak's cycle, also with the LSO, Karajan's 63 Beethoven cycle etc. All being recommended budget sets from the Penguin guide. Having listened to them over the years, I am imprinted on the sound. It did take me a long while to accept period performance and HIP performances, but in many cases I finally have, although I had to be dragged kicking and screaming into the period performance world.

The last edition that I am aware of is from 2009. They did publish a 2010 recommended repertoire book, if I am not mistaken, but I think that was it. Despite attempts to enliven the 2009 edition with DVD and SACD reviews, I think less care was put into the editing etc. I found that the text frequently included discussion of disks that were not in the "headings". The earlier editions were much better, and more carefully, edited

Another relic from that era, that I miss, is the Tower Records branch "conveniently" located right next to Lincoln Center, which sadly went bankrupt in the early 2000s. It had an absolutely massive classical (and Jazz) section, much bigger than the branch I went to earlier in my relative "youth". Even after I moved away from New York state, I would often attend concerts by the New York Philharmonic. I would emerge from the concert, go next door to the Tower Records, and now with more comfortable financial means, spend an obscene amount of money perusing the aisle, battered "store copy" of the Penguin guide in hand, and emerging with a stack of discs, some of which remain in their plastic wrap to this day! Only this week, I finally unwrapped and listened to discs that I purchased then.


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## Kiki

Seeing a picture of the Penguin Guide makes me feel a bit nostalgic, a bit sad and a bit amazed how time has changed in mere 30 years in the way we consume information. A guide like this in printed form today would be unthinkable, as it would go outdated in days. To be fair, it did too thirty years ago but we wouldn't learn of new releases, and reviews, until we saw the list of new releases in following month's Gramophone. We accepted that back then. We don't today.

I never bought the Penguin Guide. (The local library had it and no one borrowed it.) I did buy Gramophone's directory of all records ever released (that red "telephone directory"). That was enjoyable reading, great for discovering who had recorded what . Although people around me thought I was abnormal (to put it nicely) to enjoy reading a "phone book".


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## haziz

starthrower said:


> I can't speak for their classical reviews. I have one of their jazz guides and I found the writers to be rather pompous. They dismissed some of my favorite records while praising to the hilt a number of British jazzers. And there is some great British jazz, but it ain't Miles, Monk, or Ellington.


Yes, the Jazz guide is probably a bit more opinionated; there you will encounter a not so subtly hidden ranking of musicians and groups into worthy, and not worthy segments. As a fan of both musical styles (although I became interested in Jazz later), I still found both guides useful, but learned early on to take the guide with a grain of salt, and to only focus on the musicians I liked, e.g. I learned early on that I did not like most of Coltrane's work, despite him being regarded as a god by the Penguin guide (and most Jazz "authorities"). The Classical guide is less pompous, with no overt ranking of the composers, although obviously the market for records is much more saturated for some composers, more so than others. It does attempt to rank preferred recordings of the individual compositions, and while even there it is certainly the subjective opinion of the reviewers, you get less of a vibe that they are ranking the composers. You do learn early on where your own interests lay, and which advice to follow. For years I considered myself as disliking period performance, and avoided any guide, Penguin, Gramophone or others, if they steered me in that direction. I have since grown to like some period performance, and HIP practices, but that is another story.


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## HenryPenfold

haziz said:


> I first encountered it in the early 90s, after moving to the US. The local Tower records, in a New York suburb, which had a sizeable classical music section usually had a couple of dog-eared "store copies", labelled as such, and the occasional Gramophone guide, that they would let you borrow as you perused the aisles. It certainly was good for business, as far as the store was concerned. I soon afterwards acquired my own copy, and generally bought each newer edition as they came out. Initially, cash strapped, I focused on the highly ranked "budget" selections, and yes, did try and amass the ones earning rosettes, even sometimes splurging on a full price (US$15-18!) disc if it was in a genre, or of a composer I liked, although at that time I usually just lusted after the more expensive recommendations. It was apparent, soon afterwards, that this was the opinion of the editors, and I did not always agree, however it was certainly a useful guide. Over the years I ultimately did amass a massive collection since then, most of which is now sitting gathering dust, as I have find myself getting lazier and lazier and relying on high bit rate streaming serives (e.g. Tidal Master and Qobuz).
> 
> Now with a massive collection of physical CDs, and an even more massive selection from the online streaming services, I still find myself preferring the sound of many of my initial purchases, most often based on the Penguin guide, and to a lesser extent Gramophone guide, since I probably imprinted on the sound and performance style. So, to this day, I find myself often preferring Markevitch's LSO recordings of the Tchaikovsky symphonies, or Kertesz Dvorak's cycle, also with the LSO, Karajan's 63 Beethoven cycle etc. All being recommended budget sets from the Penguin guide. Having listened to them over the years, I am imprinted on the sound. It did take me a long while to accept period performance and HIP performances, but in many cases I finally have, although I had to be dragged kicking and screaming into the period performance world.
> 
> The last edition that I am aware of is from 2009. They did publish a 2010 recommended repertoire book, if I am not mistaken, but I think that was it. Despite attempts to enliven the 2009 edition with DVD and SACD reviews, I think less care was put into the editing etc. I found that the text frequently included discussion of disks that were not in the "headings". The earlier editions were much better, and more carefully, edited
> 
> Another relic from that era, that I miss, is the Tower Records branch "conveniently" located right next to Lincoln center, which sadly went bankrupt in the early 2000s. It had an absolutely massive classical (and Jazz) section, much bigger than the branch I went to earlier in my relative "youth". Even after I moved away from New York state, I would often attend concerts by the New York Philharmonic. I would emerge from the concert, go next door to the Tower Records, and now with more comfortable financial means, spend an obscene amount of money perusing the aisle, battered "store copy" of the Penguin guide in hand, and emerging from with a stack of discs, some of which remain in their plastic wrap to this day! Only this week, I finally unwrapped and listened to discs that I purchased then.


Very interesting, thanks. I'd forgotten that the HMV and Virgin shops in Oxford Street London had several PGs in a corner of the classical section, along with nice comfy leather chairs! Nowadays, I just download the latest Hi-Res, check the meta data and add to my library. It's just not anywhere near as good!


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## Malx

In the early days of collecting and way before the internet I used the Penguin Guide and Gramophone's Classical Music Guide as reference points as to where to turn to.
In the early days if the recording didn't achieve a three star rating I tended not to consider it.
I also recall the HMV store on Princes Street Edinburgh had a coffee table with a few of the guides along with the Jazz and Opera variants available for reference - sitting there in the comfy leather sofas looking out over the Castle and listening to a couple of possible purchases passed a few lunch times when I was in Edinburgh for work - generally turned out to be expensive lunches!

I still have the last copy I bought (1996) along with the last Gramophone Classical Guide I acquired, the 2010 edition in one of those stores that sold excess book stocks. They sit on my desk by the upstairs system - truth be told I never refer to them these days, I guess they are still there for purely nostalgic reasons.
(next to the speaker)


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## Merl

I'm sure the first one I got looked like the one below. I found it in a secondhand bookshop in Shudehill in Manchester, sometime in the mid 80s. I thought I still had it in the loft but I can't find it. It's up there somewhere but god knows where, exactly.


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## Manxfeeder

I still have the 2002 edition. Since a lot of Pre-2002 recordings are being released in more inexpensive issuings or are turning up in my used CD store, I still use it frequently.


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## hoodjem

I still have three or four editions.
I used to refer to them quite a bit . . . before the internet.

One thing I always suspected (and was a bit put off by) that has been corroborated was a definite pro-British bias.
Nevertheless, it was decent guide--if not a bible.


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## Merl

hoodjem said:


> I still have three or four editions.
> I used to refer to them quite a bit . . . before the internet.
> 
> One thing I always suspected (and was a bit put off by) that has been corroborated was a definite pro-British bias.
> Nevertheless, it was decent guide--if not a bible.


Like a number of journos, bias was obvious. They had British conductors they loved (Handley and Hickox were definitely amongst them) and Eastern European conductors they thought little of (Neumann was definitely one of those). Every Neumann recording was "stiff", according to them and even praise was countered by "this conductor is usually stiff in this repertoire" but tbh they were no worse than Hurwitz and his American bias and Rattle hatred (which is why he is as he is - in response to those Penguin Guides and the early online Gramophone reviews).


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## Brahmsianhorn

My favorite thing about the Penguin Guide was their openness to all styles and genres. That is essential. Someone presenting a biased, narrow view with an axe to grind (okay, Hurwitz) is not a reference IMO.

Indeed, if there was a Bible for classical music recordings, it was the Penguin Guide.


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## GraemeG

I think all the of the original authors have shuffled off in the last 3-4 years as well.
In retrospect the guide was always flawed because of its attempt to review current releases.

The last guide of the type I bought was a vast tome called "Third Ear" Guide to Classical Music recordings, which although not especially even in its distribution of reviews (the entire oeuvre of Bruckner received less column coverage than Tchaikovsky 4, for instance) was discussing, largely, all recordings made, regardless of current availability. This was back in 2003, proving a prescient guide for current times, when giant brick-box re-issues keep antiquated recordings of all sorts before our very ears.

Their introduction promised updates every few years, but they never materialised as far as I know.
But the guide was a great concept. With Penguin you needed to keep all the previous versions you bought over the previous 15 years just to keep up with the deletions.


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## Merl

GraemeG said:


> ... But the guide was a great concept. With Penguin you needed to keep all the previous versions you bought over the previous 15 years just to keep up with the deletions.


Yeah, at one point I had about 3 or 4 on the go
After I bought the one pictured in my first post, I picked up a few others in various secondhand bookshops around Manchester. Like you said, Graeme, you definitely needed the old ones to find the OOP stuff


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## Handelian

I got one of the last ones which was 2008. It started off as the Record Guide and became the Penguine Guide the the Penguine Stereo Guide to Compact Discs. It was, for all its faults, a really good, pre-internet, reference book. Astonishingly comprehensive. Of course, with the multiplication of recordings it became less and less comprehensive by reason of space but mine is nearly 1600 pp! The guys who did it have all passed on now but they were a model of balances reviewing. There is a need for something similar on the internet now.


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## mbhaub

My first Penguin was the 1982 . I think I have virtually every edition, update, the Film Music ones and everything in between. For me, reading the Penguin was great summer beach entertainment! I have kept them all, and can't imagine throwing them out. It was a great series while it lasted, and sadly we'll never see anything like it again.


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## WNvXXT

I've got 2010 and 2002. The former is used the most, has the most yellow sticky tabs.


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## Art Rock

I bought one around 1990 and a second updated one around 1995 IIRC. These books, and the monthly Gramophone, were my main guides to buying classical CD's (the time before widespread internet). I can't recall buying any CD that was warmly recommended, but which I did not like.


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## Jokke

I still enjoy the "Penguin guide to Jazz Recordings - ninth edition from 2008". It seems to be a collectible, valued 400 Euro second hand.


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## Knorf

I certainly leaned on the Peguin Guide very heavily in the early days of my collecting, so mainly in the 1980s and early 1990s. At some point I learned to trust my own instincts. I also came to know where the Penguin Guide reviewers' tastes and mine overlapped, and thankfully it was quite a large overlap. Certainly mostly positives, only occasionally false positives, and vanishingly few false negatives.

The main way I felt lead astray as I recall was their effusive praise for Valdimir Ashkenazy as a conductor. I mostly have found his conducting very boring. I recall buying an Ashkenazy (Philharmonia?) Beethoven 7 on the PG's recommendation and it was quite disappointing. It did not last long in my collection.

But they also did me a big favor. I had purchased Solti's CSO Bruckner 7, and at the time assumed from my disappointment that I just wasn't into Bruckner. A subsequent PG issue panned it, and I thought, ok, let's give this Bruckner another try. That turned out to be Karajan for Bruckner 6, which they recommended, and there began my lifelong fascination with Bruckner. And I still love Karajan's Bruckner... Even with all the great Bruckner recordings out there and on my shelf, it's still a fave.

Anyway, very much _unlike_ David "Vapid Numbskull" Hurwitz, the Penguin Guide reviewers were always open to hearing new ways of approaching major repertoire, did not reflexively pan less well-known names, did not ignorantly trash major 20th-c. repertoire but made a real effort to understand it, and generally tried to be positive in approaching any new recording, and not just look for any reasons at all to merely sling invective. Bravo to them for that!


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## HenryPenfold

Knorf said:


> I certainly leaned on the Peguin Guide very heavily in the early days of my collecting, so mainly in the 1980s and early 1990s. At some point I learned to trust my own instincts. I also came to know where the Penguin Guide reviewers' tastes and mine overlapped, and thankfully it was quite a large overlap. Certainly mostly positives, only occasionally false positives, and vanishingly few false negatives.
> 
> The main way I felt lead astray as I recall was their effusive praise for Valdimir Ashkenazy as a conductor. I mostly have found his conducting very boring. I recall buying an Ashkenazy (Philharmonia?) Beethoven 7 on the PG's recommendation and it was quite disappointing. It did not last long in my collection.
> 
> But they also did me a big favor. I had purchased Solti's CSO Bruckner 7, and at the time assumed from my disappointment that I just wasn't into Bruckner. A subsequent PG issue panned it, and I thought, ok, let's give this Bruckner another try. That turned out to be Karajan for Bruckner 6, which they recommended, and there began my lifelong fascination with Bruckner. And I still love Karajan's Bruckner... Even with all the great Bruckner recordings out there and on my shelf, it's still a fave.
> 
> Anyway, very much _unlike_ David "Vapid Numbskull" Hurwitz, the Penguin Guide reviewers were always open to hearing new ways of approaching major repertoire, did not reflexively pan less well-known names, did not ignorantly trash major 20th-c. repertoire but made a real effort to understand it, and generally tried to be positive in approaching any new recording, and not just look for any reasons at all to sling invective. Bravo to them for that!


Interesting thoughts. I really enjoy Ashkenazy's conducting and saw him a couple of times with the Philharmonia the last time he visited the UK. exhilarating performances of Sibelius and Rachmaninov (helped by an out of this world performance by Trifonov). I swear by his Walton symphonies 1&2 on Decca.

Otherwise, I have had a very similar experience as yourself with the guides and like you, I'm grateful for that.

You make an excellent observation on something that I've never picked up on - the review team would approach Xanakis, Kagle, Rhim, Schoneberg and similar, in the same way as they would Haydn or Mozart. That never occurred to me and you are right. And yes, young David could learn something from them!


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## Knorf

To be fair to Ashkenazy, I think he improved since those days. That Beethoven 7 was pretty early in his conducting career. You might be able to find it online: give it a listen and see what you think. For me, I recall finding it slowish and kinda dull, but you know how are tastes are. I might not even agree with my 20-yr old self! It was 30 years ago last I heard it...


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## HenryPenfold

Knorf said:


> To be fair to Ashkenazy, I think he improved since those days. That Beethoven 7 was pretty early in his conducting career. You might be able to find it online: give it a listen and see what you think. For me, I recall finding it slowish and kinda dull, but you know how are tastes are. I might not even agree with my 20-yr old self! It was 30 years ago last I heard it...


Ah yes, I have heard his Beethoven 7 and others and I wouldn't disagree with you.


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## Dan Ante

Art Rock said:


> I bought one around 1990 and a second updated one around 1995 IIRC. These books, and the monthly Gramophone, were my main guides to buying classical CD's (the time before widespread internet). I can't recall buying any CD that was warmly recommended, but which I did not like.


I have the 1990 and 1995 but unfortunately passed on earlier editions to friends. Do you remember The Melody Maker a weekly paper if I remember rightly. I also found the Penguin recommendations spot on.


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## HenryPenfold

Dan Ante said:


> I have the 1990 and 1995 but unfortunately passed on earlier editions to friends. Do you remember The Melody Maker a weekly paper if I remember rightly. I also found the Penguin recommendations spot on.


I remember Melody Maker, my first music mag (paper) in the 1970s. Used 'Sounds' for rock/metal/prog, then moved onto NME (New Musical Express) in late 1976. I subscribed to Kerrang! and Wired. I suppose I'm a bit of a glutton for this sort of thing!!!!


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## Merl

HenryPenfold said:


> I remember Melody Maker, my first music mag (paper) in the 1970s. Used 'Sounds' for rock/metal/prog, then moved onto NME (New Musical Express) in late 1976. I subscribed to Kerrang! and Wired. I suppose I'm a bit of a glutton for this sort of thing!!!!


Geoff Barton @ Sounds... Remember it well.


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## GrosseFugue

Oh, man, I had one from the 90's and kept it around for years (till I had to chuck it to clean out my storage). Used it to help build up a library, though I lacked the discernment then to appreciate the qualities they touted.

What I remember most was their great way with words! Wish I'd saved some of their more awesome reviews for the sheer language! They could describe the thrills in an album without resorting to musical arcana. It was like a distinguished (Romantic?) school of record reviewing which sadly I think is gone forever.

Does anyone know if the reviews are online anywhere? A shame if they're not! Do they still have a copyright? Can't someone (like Presto Classical!) just buy them all for cheap and put them on their site as a supplement?

If ever I were pressed to attach a voice to them it'd be James Mason's. Like that's the kind of style and poise they conveyed:






PS -- Anyone know if the Rosette CDs sold on Presto have the full Penguin reviews included in the booklet? Just curious!


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## Geoff48

The first guide I actually bought was the paperback guide to bargain records which first came out in the sixties. It was a great guide to the ultra cheap labels, about 50p in today’s money, and I found it distinguished between the merely cheap, often execrably recorded, and the good value. I still have the dog eared copy which I occasionally read although I rarely play LPs nowadays. But one thing I remember is that it accepted many of the pseudonyms of those labels at face value and I actually believed that conductors such as Felix Heiss, Otto Strauss, and Karl Winter, and pianists such as Auguste du Maurier actually existed. The innocence of youth.
Actually that might make an interesting thread. If any of the oldies like me have actually worked out who some of these guys actually were; “Felix Heiss” in particular was a first class Tchaikovsky conductor.


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## Mark Dee

If ever I'm hunting down some charity (thrift shop) vinyl, I'll look for any with the 'Penguin Recommended' sticker on them


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## Bruckner Anton

TBO, the Penguin Guide is heavily biased towards British artists and it has limited influence on me when I pick my recordings. I would rather prefer some reviews from Japan on classical music recordings which are quite neutral compared with things like Penguin or Gramophone.


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## JB Henson

I have the 2008 (which I believe was the last REAL Penguin Guide) and an older "New Stereo Record and Cassette Guide" (aka Confused Nipper) which I think is from 1982.


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## Algonquin

JB Henson said:


> I have the 2008 (which I believe was the last REAL Penguin Guide) and an older "New Stereo Record and Cassette Guide" (aka Confused Nipper) which I think is from 1982.


2010 was the last published. I still have it as well as the previous editions and yearbooks going back to 1994. One is being used now, as I type this, to elevate my monitor. They still come in handy when I need a review of deleted material.


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## JB Henson

Algonquin said:


> 2010 was the last published. I still have it as well as the previous editions and yearbooks going back to 1994. One is being used now, as I type this, to elevate my monitor. They still come in handy when I need a review of deleted material.


From what I heard the 2009 and 2010 guides ditched the old format for an ABYD-style. Hence 2008 being the "last real one".


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## Art Rock

What is an ABYD-style? Google did not help.


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## Saxman

hoodjem said:


> I still have three or four editions.
> I used to refer to them quite a bit . . . before the internet.
> 
> *One thing I always suspected (and was a bit put off by) that has been corroborated was a definite pro-British bias*.
> Nevertheless, it was decent guide--if not a bible.





Bruckner Anton said:


> *TBO, the Penguin Guide is heavily biased towards British artists* and it has limited influence on me when I pick my recordings. I would rather prefer some reviews from Japan on classical music recordings which are quite neutral compared with things like Penguin or Gramophone.


I've heard this claim made many times Do you have any evidence?

For me, it's use is (was) not as a guide of recommendations, but rather a guide to each performance. The Gramophone Guide was even better in this sense as it had greater detail of the covered performances (and some of the key decisions made by the performers/artists).


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## CnC Bartok

Saxman said:


> I've heard this claim made many times Do you have any evidence?
> 
> For me, it's use is (was) not as a guide of recommendations, but rather a guide to each performance. The Gramophone Guide was even better in this sense as it had greater detail of the covered performances (and some of the key decisions made by the performers/artists).


They did tend to give glowing reviews to such British artists as Simon Rattle, the Lindsay Quartet, Vernon Handley. So if you don't like them, then it's possible to see pro-British bias. Of course, it could have been something to do with availability, repertoire, or appealing to their core audience? Apparently Gramophone is biased as well! Pinch of salt time....

What I found biased was an almost exclusive tendency to slag off singers with "Slavic wobble", whatever that may be, and any recordings by Vaclav Neumann were automatically dulll and uninspiring. Not an opinion I hold, shall we say...

Strangely, I have found myself referring to my old Penguin Guides quite a bit in recent years. What with the plethora of old boxed set releases in recent years, it has become more interesting to look back on these things....


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## JB Henson

Art Rock said:


> What is an ABYD-style? Google did not help.


Albums to hear Before You Die.


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## jim prideaux

I have just checked my oldest copy....1984.

If I knew how to stcik a photogrpah on here I would but the title on the cover says it all.....

'Stereo Record and Cassette Guide
now including Compact Discs'


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## Merl

^ I had a couple of the earlier guides too, Jim, but they're hidden away somewhere in the loft. I seem to remember having to throw the earliest one away as it rotted and fell apart. I bought it from a secondhand bookshop in Shudehill, Manchester many moons ago (when that part of Manc was called Shudehill and not the pretentious 'Northern Quarter') .


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## Itullian

I loved those books. i spent hours reading them and discussing them with friends. I really miss them.


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## wkasimer

Itullian said:


> I loved those books. i spent hours reading them and discussing them with friends. I really miss them.


I found them less and less useful as the years went by. The coverage of the repertoire became less comprehensive, and the descriptions were too brief to be very useful.

Does anyone else remember this book? This was my first "guide" to recordings, and I still have a copy on the shelf for nostalgia's sake:


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## Merl

wkasimer said:


> I found them less and less useful as the years went by. The coverage of the repertoire became less comprehensive, and the descriptions were too brief to be very useful.
> 
> Does anyone else remember this book? This was my first "guide" to recordings, and I still have a copy on the shelf for nostalgia's sake:
> 
> View attachment 154235


Never heard of it.


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