# Which composer inspires the worst CD cover art?



## Vesteralen (Jul 14, 2011)

Pardon my silly question, but I just got really interested in C P E Bach from some things I was reading and went to browse through the available CDs in Amazon.

Talk about ugly album art.

Any other nominees?


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

Any popular opera composer.


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## Aramis (Mar 1, 2009)

violadude said:


> Any popular opera composer.


???????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????


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## Ravndal (Jun 8, 2012)

Haha. Great thread idea. Il keep an eye up.


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## Vesteralen (Jul 14, 2011)

I'm beginning to think the best thing I can do with old CPE is buy this:









The maximum CPE with the minimum bad cover art.


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## Vesteralen (Jul 14, 2011)

And, of course, the one thing to avoid at all costs is a portrait of the composer:









(Which makes me kind of glad _*I'm* _not a composer....


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## Art Rock (Nov 28, 2009)

Bruckner symphonies:

View attachment 33698


View attachment 33700


View attachment 33702


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## Winterreisender (Jul 13, 2013)

Vesteralen said:


> I'm beginning to think the best thing I can do with old CPE is buy this:
> 
> View attachment 33687
> 
> ...


Didn't know this box set existed, but now I'm definitely buying it. Thanks for the heads up!!


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

Aramis said:


> ???????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????


Think about it. Operas like Aida are just asking for some tacky marketeer to slap a CD cover of people dressed up in dorky "Egyptian" costumes on the front.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Vesteralen said:


> And, of course, the one thing to avoid at all costs is a portrait of the composer:
> 
> View attachment 33690
> 
> ...


Looks a lot like my Uncle Herman.


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## Aramis (Mar 1, 2009)

violadude said:


> Think about it. Operas like Aida are just asking for some tacky marketeer to slap a CD cover of people dressed up in dorky "Egyptian" costumes on the front.


They might be asking for it but when I recall the most popular Aidas on CD - Karajan, Abbado, Serafin or Muti, I can't think of one meeting your description. Though I guess with some effort, you might find such cover among others. Anyway, I don't see any bad tendention with opera covers.

Maybe with Wagner. There are three kinds of Wagner covers: dull cover with photo of conductor, dull cover with old photography of singer, ridiculous and pseudo-epic cover with ... shall we say, Wagnerian Hero:


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## Itullian (Aug 27, 2011)

Or a cover with just a ring on it.


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## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

If I were going simply by the worst examples I could think of, this would be near the top of my list...


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

Aramis said:


> They might be asking for it but when I recall the most popular Aidas on CD - Karajan, Abbado, Serafin or Muti, I can't think of one meeting your description. Though I guess with some effort, you might find such cover among others. Anyway, I don't see any bad tendention with opera covers.


The most popular recordings of any piece of music probably aren't going to apply to this thread...


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## Aramis (Mar 1, 2009)

violadude said:


> The most popular recordings of any piece of music probably aren't going to apply to this thread...


Are you sure:










OH WAIT I JUST SHOOT MYSELF IN THE FOOT


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## Vinyl (Jan 22, 2014)

I know this tickles the sixties aesthetics with some, but only the words on this cover make me want to put it on at all. Gah.









And yes, I think Strauss ranks high. Or maybe Decca. Or the sixties.


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## Crudblud (Dec 29, 2011)

Mahlerian said:


> If I were going simply by the worst examples I could think of, this would be near the top of my list...
> 
> View attachment 33707


Obviously referencing the abandoned 7th movement of the 3rd Symphony: _What the Parrot on the Boat Next to the Landmass Which has in a Rather Inconvenient Turn of Events Engulfed Me up to My Head Tells Me_.


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## Marschallin Blair (Jan 23, 2014)

Aramis said:


> Are you sure:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! Ha. Ha. Ha. Ha. Great. . . "From Dusk 'Til Del Monaco."


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## Itullian (Aug 27, 2011)

Wagner maybe?


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## Marschallin Blair (Jan 23, 2014)

Itullian said:


> Wagner maybe?


Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. . . I don't know. . . Maybe, just maybe, I DO believe in capital punishment.


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## StlukesguildOhio (Dec 25, 2006)

The worst covers I can think of consistently applied to a single composer must surely be those of the Naive label Vivaldi series which look like failed _haute couture_ shots:





Only a few of this series make any sense... mostly the sacred works which leads me to believe that the designers gave some thought to not offending. The Gloria suggests a woman with a halo, the Sacred Concerti robes the model in a blue robe not unlike that commonly employed in paintings of the Virgin, and the Vespers of the Virgin is perhaps the best of the lot... while the Opera Arias set is simply not unattractive... in spite of having nothing whatsoever to do with Vivaldi, the singers, or the works contained. Ironically... these are some damn good recordings... so I'm stuck looking at them far more than I would like.


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## StlukesguildOhio (Dec 25, 2006)

Aramis said:


> Are you sure:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Looks like it was shot by the same guys who did the cover for the classic Louvin Brothers LP, _Satan is Real:_


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## Aramis (Mar 1, 2009)

> The worst covers I can think of consistently applied to a single composer must surely be those of the Naive label Vivaldi series which look like failed haute couture shots


Absolutely, how could I forget it myself. The one for Stabat Mater might be the worst among them but it's the one for Lehtipuu singing tenor arias that got me really confused at one point. I saw it before getting to know the conception of these covers and being used to singer being portrayed on front of his own recital disc, I've found myself thinking: "what did they do to the poor man? I don't recall him looking like that!".


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Vinyl said:


> I know this tickles the sixties aesthetics with some, but only the words on this cover make me want to put it on at all. Gah.
> 
> View attachment 33708
> 
> ...


Birgit Nilsson meets Hammer!


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

violadude said:


> Think about it. Operas like Aida are just asking for some tacky marketeer to slap a CD cover of people dressed up in dorky "Egyptian" costumes on the front.


With full stage makeup meant to be read from at a remove of at least thirty rows or more away, _but in close-up._ 
NICE! (Halloween is prettier.)


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Itullian said:


> Wagner maybe?


Where did I put the vomit bowl?


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## StlukesguildOhio (Dec 25, 2006)

The one for Stabat Mater might be the worst among them but it's the one for Lehtipuu singing tenor arias that got me really confused at one point.

And don't miss that disc of Bass Arias with the model who looks like Pee Wee Herman. :lol:


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## Blancrocher (Jul 6, 2013)

DavidA said:


> Where did I put the vomit bowl?


Saw this sentence on the "Activity Stream," so of course I had to come into the thread to take a look.

Thanks.


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## Vinyl (Jan 22, 2014)

This isn't a composer inspiring bad cover art, but a label giving the designer free reign. Sorry for the slight off-topic post. Again I think it's the sixties. This artists designs are all somewhere mid-way between Sesame Street and the first twinkles of an LSD trip. 
The records are mostly bad as well, tbh. A cheap branch of Supraphone. I have six or seven of them, including some works I would love to listen to, but they just don't make the cut...


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## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

I think those Vivaldi/Naive covers look great, but I haven't bought any of them - it is Vivaldi after all.


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## Marschallin Blair (Jan 23, 2014)

StlukesguildOhio said:


> The worst covers I can think of consistently applied to a single composer must surely be those of the Naive label Vivaldi series which look like failed _haute couture_ shots:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Now that's a real hard act to follow: "Worst-in-Show Best in Show."


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## FLighT (Mar 7, 2013)

This is the best thread ever!

That Tristan und Isolde cover makes me want to wash my eyeballs with soap.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Wagner does seem to...uh...inspire some cover designers.


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## Flamme (Dec 30, 2012)

Aramis said:


> Are you sure:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


This is actually awesome


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## Marschallin Blair (Jan 23, 2014)

KenOC said:


> Wagner does seem to...uh...inspire some cover designers.


You know?-- It's hard to be all sunshine and light on this. This is greatness I TREASURE. These people are nilhilists and clowns. What did Ayn Rand call it?-- "The hatred of the good for being good"?-- yeah, just that. . . funny though still. . . Ha. Ha. Ha. . . in a 'hideous sort of way.'


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Well, it's not classical but it's well-known as an example of something.


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## SimonNZ (Jul 12, 2012)

The BIS Edition of CPE Bach all have perfectly acceptable covers

-

now here's one of my favorite wtf-were-they-thinking worsts:


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## Centropolis (Jul 8, 2013)

Marschallin Blair said:


> Now that's a real hard act to follow: "Worst-in-Show Best in Show."


Not great CD covers but great photography work IMO.


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## StlukesguildOhio (Dec 25, 2006)

SimonNZ said:


> The BIS Edition of CPE Bach all have perfectly acceptable covers
> 
> -
> 
> now here's one of my favorite wtf-were-they-thinking worsts:


I'm reminded of my studio mate who couldn't handle more than 5 or 10 minutes of Eric Dolphy... yet paints these big "ugly" "dissonant" paintings. I pointed out to him that to many people his paintings are as "ugly" as he found Eric Dolphy's music. So are we more likely to dismiss the more "dissonant" aspects of visual art, while unable to fathom why many would find Henze or Xenakis or Stockhausen equally "painful?" Just playing the devil's advocate here.


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## Weston (Jul 11, 2008)

For me Shostakovich is the frontrunner.

















That 2nd example I found so egregious I "replaced" it with my own Photoshopped cover design using a nice Yves Tanguy painting instead. Much better! That entire Teldarc series is like that, but this was the worst of the lot I thought.


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## SimonNZ (Jul 12, 2012)

StLukes: There's a paragraph from The Rest Is Noise that gives one of the most concise answers to that issue:

"Psychological factors also come into play when the music is set in front of a crowd. Looking at a painting in a gallery is fundamentally different from listenting to a new work in a concert hall. Picture yourself in a room with, say, Kandinsky's Impression III (Concert), painted in 1911. Kandinsky and Schoenberg knew each other, and shared common aims; Impression III was inspired by one of Schoenberg's concerts. If visual abstraction and musical dissonance were precisely equivalent, Impression III and the third of the Five Pieces for Orchestra would present the same degree of difficulty. But the Kandinsky is a different experience for the uninitiated. If at first you have trouble understanding it, you can walk on and return to it later, or step back to give it another glance, or lean in for a close look (is that a piano in the foreground?). At a performance, listeners experience a new work collectively, at the same rate and approximately from the same distance. They cannot stop to consider the implications of a half-lovely chord or concealed waltz rythym. They are a a crowd, and crowds tend to align themselves as one mind."

My problem with the scary portrait on the Henze cd isn't so much with the work as the effectiveness of that work in marketing and as representing the music. It also buys into that whole self-defeating contemporary classical thing of "messy covers for (supposedly) messy music" that I really hate.


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## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

SimonNZ said:


> My problem with the scary portrait on the Henze cd isn't so much with the work as the effectiveness of that work in marketing and as representing the music. It also buys into that whole self-defeating contemporary classical thing of "messy covers for (supposedly) messy music" that I really hate.


There's also the "abstract cover for abstract music" thing...which is not "quite" as offensive, perhaps...

























Wait a sec...what's Bernstein doing here?


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## SimonNZ (Jul 12, 2012)

Heh. Actually I love the DG 20th Century covers, possibly a sentimental attatchment - they were around when I first started listening to CM, though at that point I only owned a small number


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## Itullian (Aug 27, 2011)

KenOC said:


> Wagner does seem to...uh...inspire some cover designers.


Walkure by Vaughn Williams? haha
very interesting


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## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

SimonNZ said:


> Heh. Actually I love the DG 20th Century covers, possibly a sentimental attatchment - they were around when I first started listening to CM, though at that point I only owned a small number.


See, you could have this instead:

























That last one has _got_ to be banking on the success of 2001...


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## Marschallin Blair (Jan 23, 2014)

Itullian said:


> Walkure by Vaughn Williams? haha
> very interesting


My memory's a little hazy, Iutullian, but I have a recollection of Ursula Vaughan Williams saying that young Ralph was at the piano, and played a piece for one of his friends, and told his friend that it was a piece he wrote called, "The Charge of the Light Brigade"- which was in fact, "The Ride of the Valkyries."

-- totally something I would have done. Ha. Ha. Ha.


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## Marschallin Blair (Jan 23, 2014)

Mahlerian said:


> See, you could have this instead:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Those are stellar finds, Mahlerian. I especially like the Schoenberg cover. Well, I would, as I was always enthralled by painters and set designers at Diaghilev's Ballet Russes like Alexandre Benois and Leon Bakst-- that whole exotic, Orientalist, Erasian-Asian thing.


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## Itullian (Aug 27, 2011)

Marschallin Blair said:


> My memory's a little hazy, Iutullian, but I have a recollection of Ursula Vaughan Williams saying that young Ralph was at the piano, and played a piece for one of his friends, and told his friend that it was a piece he wrote called, "The Charge of the Light Brigade"- which was in fact, "The Ride of the Valkyries."
> 
> -- totally something I would have done. Ha. Ha. Ha.


One of those stories I hope is true 
thanks for that


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

StlukesguildOhio said:


> Looks like it was shot by the same guys who did the cover for the classic Louvin Brothers LP, _Satan is Real:_


Satan worked for Capitol Records!


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

Mahlerian said:


> There's also the "abstract cover for abstract music" thing...which is not "quite" as offensive, perhaps...
> 
> 
> 
> ...


I recently bought a used copy of that Bernstein 2 disc set for under 3 dollars.


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## Marschallin Blair (Jan 23, 2014)

Itullian said:


> One of those stories I hope is true
> thanks for that


Me remembrance des choses anneaux dernières véritables rings true.

Behold now the evidence:


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

starthrower said:


> Satan worked for Capitol Records!


I hear they stiffed him his fee. He got all burned up about that.


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## Itullian (Aug 27, 2011)

Marschallin Blair said:


> Me remembrance des choses anneaux dernières véritables rings true.
> 
> Behold now the evidence:
> 
> View attachment 33751


Truly amazing.


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## BurningDesire (Jul 15, 2012)

Mahlerian said:


> If I were going simply by the worst examples I could think of, this would be near the top of my list...
> 
> View attachment 33707


I always suspected Mahler to be the secret 5th Beatle :3


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## Kivimees (Feb 16, 2013)

I think Shostakovich takes a lot of abuse on CD covers. So many of them have blatant Soviet symbolism.

They remind me a lot of those Soviet-era "Glory to work!" posters.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Kivimees said:


> I think Shostakovich takes a lot of abuse on CD covers. So many of them have blatant Soviet symbolism.
> 
> They remind me a lot of those Soviet-era "Glory to work!" posters.


I like 'em!


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

KenOC said:


> Wagner does seem to...uh...inspire some cover designers.


Makes a change from the usual gargantuan singers we usually associate with Wagner.


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## Flamme (Dec 30, 2012)

SimonNZ said:


> The BIS Edition of CPE Bach all have perfectly acceptable covers
> 
> -
> 
> now here's one of my favorite wtf-were-they-thinking worsts:


Now this is creepy...


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## HaydnBearstheClock (Jul 6, 2013)

Ravel?


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## Vesteralen (Jul 14, 2011)

This BIS cover for CPE Bach is certainly clean, but all 20-some albums in this set with the same picture in different colors is kind of boring, don't you think?

I did find some nice CPE covers, though, finally, at CPO, like this...









and some others as well. So, maybe I'll have to move old CPE out of contention, after all.


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## Vinyl (Jan 22, 2014)

Regarding Shostakovitch: How much better than Soviet propaganda is a portrait, when you look like this?


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## DrKilroy (Sep 29, 2012)

He doesn't look that bad in this picture, really.

Best regards, Dr


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## Marschallin Blair (Jan 23, 2014)

KenOC said:


> I like 'em!


Bolshevism, no; SuperCinemascope battle epic, yes.


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## Marschallin Blair (Jan 23, 2014)

DrKilroy said:


> He doesn't look that bad in this picture, really.
> 
> Best regards, Dr


No, of course not. . . his looks are unique for a god; and ordinary mortals are oblivious to it. ;D


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## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

Vesteralen said:


> View attachment 33779
> 
> 
> This BIS cover for CPE Bach is certainly clean, but all 20-some albums in this set with the same picture in different colors is kind of boring, don't you think?
> ...


In addition to being a total bore, those BIS covers reveal a lack of imagination.


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## GreenMamba (Oct 14, 2012)

The Moonlight Sonata has inspired a lot of bad covers, not to mention bad interpretations. I think this gets the piece all wrong.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Ummmm.....yeah.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Yuja Wang's new Rach 3 has a portrait of her which is appalling.

http://www.deutschegrammophon.com/en/cat/4791304

She's quite a looker as well. How on earth someone devised this is beyond me!


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

DavidA said:


> Yuja Wang's new Rach 3 has a portrait of her which is appalling.
> 
> http://www.deutschegrammophon.com/en/cat/4791304
> 
> She's quite a looker as well. How on earth someone devised this is beyond me!


That dress is giving me a migraine!


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## Marschallin Blair (Jan 23, 2014)

DavidA said:


> Yuja Wang's new Rach 3 has a portrait of her which is appalling.
> 
> http://www.deutschegrammophon.com/en/cat/4791304
> 
> She's quite a looker as well. How on earth someone devised this is beyond me!


Promising. . . I like what I see and hear in the video of the Prokofiev Second Piano Concerto.


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## Marschallin Blair (Jan 23, 2014)

hpowders said:


> That dress is giving me a migraine!


Ha. Ha. Hah!!! Oh my God! You said what I only intuitively and subconsciously felt. Ha. Ha. Ha.

The cute thing needs a suitably appropriate Hermes bag and a Vera Wang dress.


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

violadude said:


> Think about it. Operas like Aida are just asking for some tacky marketeer to slap a CD cover of people dressed up in dorky "Egyptian" costumes on the front.


Yep, opera covers tend to portray ethnic stereotypes in a very predictable way. Madama Butterfly inevitably has a Japanese lady with a fan, Carmen a Spanish lady (or a bullfighter), and Wagner some horned helmeted blond-haired-blue-eyed goddess or superhero (well, the Wagner one I put below hasn't got blonde hair, but I was too lazy, but its close enough to the ol' cliche, no?).


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## Vesteralen (Jul 14, 2011)

Looks a bit like a Tiffany lamp. 

Oddly, I Don't mind it that much.

(Why does my tablet always insist on capitalizing Don't?

Sid posted before I did. Reference the Yuja Wang picture for mine.


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## Aramis (Mar 1, 2009)

Sid James said:


> Yep, opera = ethnic stereotypes galore. Madama Butterfly inevitably has a Japanese lady with a fan, Carmen a Spanish lady (or a bullfighter), and Wagner some horned helmeted blond-haired-blue-eyed Nibelungian goddess or superhero


I thought that kimonos and fans are what Japanese ladies actually did wear in the times in which Madama Butterfly is set. I wonder how picturing the characters as how they should look like by all means of logic is ethnic stereotypes galore. And what might possibly be a "Nibelungian goddess"?


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

Aramis said:


> I thought that kimonos and fans are what Japanese ladies actually did wear in the times in which Madama Butterfly is set. I wonder how picturing the characters as how they should look like by all means of logic is ethnic stereotypes galore. And what might possibly be a "Nibelungian goddess"?


I thought this was a fun thread, but I'll edit my post as a response to your objection (I have also removed another post).


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Marschallin Blair said:


> Promising. . . I like what I see and hear in the video of the Prokofiev Second Piano Concerto.


The Prokofiev sounds really promising. There is a trailer to the disc:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=gbjklh1WuUw


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## Chris (Jun 1, 2010)

One of the first CDs I bought:


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## Vesteralen (Jul 14, 2011)

Composer/CD analysis begins:

*Karl Friedrich Abel*

Unless I really wanted this music, I would not want to buy these CDs:















On the other hand, I might take a chance on this:


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Marschallin Blair said:


> Promising. . . I like what I see and hear in the video of the Prokofiev Second Piano Concerto.


Yes, and the Rach 3 trailer

www.youtube.com/watch?v=NxmZeVMsf_c


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Chris said:


> One of the first CDs I bought:
> 
> View attachment 33845


This is not good....This is not good.....


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## revdrdave (Jan 8, 2014)

Vinyl said:


> Regarding Shostakovitch: How much better than Soviet propaganda is a portrait, when you look like this?
> 
> View attachment 33782


:lol::lol::lol:
Dmitri appears as if he could use a bit more roughage in his diet...


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## Headphone Hermit (Jan 8, 2014)

My CDs are currently in boxes as I'm decorating the room they normally sit in, but when I put them back on the shelves I'll look out for any howlers 

In the meantime, are there any discs that have such awful covers that you have left them in the shop instead of buying them?


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## Vinyl (Jan 22, 2014)

Headphone Hermit said:


> In the meantime, are there any discs that have such awful covers that you have left them in the shop instead of buying them?


Yes, and I have records right here in my shelves I don't play because the cover shouts "BAD TASTE! BAD JUDGEMENT! PROBABLY BAD MUSIC!". Probably not true, but the cover does make a difference. 
The opposite is also true. I've bought records just because the covers were awesome. More often than not the music is good, too.


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## TurnaboutVox (Sep 22, 2013)

Have we had this one yet? (click to enlarge)

There are self conscious string quartet portraits and there are _self-conscious string quartet portraits._ Anyone who knows only their Shostakovich CD set would not know the full horror of the Fitzwilliams portrayed on their Decca LP covers as a quartet of Open University lecturers circa 1974. On a walk in a wood. As a young man I could not let these be seen in my possession... (oh yes, there are others).

Eeeeurgh!


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## SimonNZ (Jul 12, 2012)

Looking at that makes me think of all the examples I've seen of "Great Artists In Bad Seventies Fashions".


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

SimonNZ said:


> Looking at that makes me think of all the examples I've seen of "Great Artists In Bad Seventies Fashions".


Yes, but is that quartet cover as bad as this quintet cover?


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## Donata (Dec 28, 2013)

Cheesy Battlestar Galactica rejects, what's not to love?


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## OldFashionedGirl (Jul 21, 2013)

TurnaboutVox said:


> View attachment 33979
> 
> 
> Have we had this one yet? (click to enlarge)
> ...


This looks like a cover from a seventies pop band.



KenOC said:


> Yes, but is that quartet cover as bad as this quintet cover?


HAHAHA!


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## elgar's ghost (Aug 8, 2010)

I think this cover shot was singularly ill-advised on all counts - clothes, stance, hair...

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images...__PJautoripBadge,BottomRight,4,-40_OU11__.jpg

This seems a little pretentious as well:

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images...__PJautoripBadge,BottomRight,4,-40_OU11__.jpg


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## Itullian (Aug 27, 2011)

KenOC said:


> Yes, but is that quartet cover as bad as this quintet cover?


Likes it ..................


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## TurnaboutVox (Sep 22, 2013)

et pouvez-vous expliquer cela ...?


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

^^^^J'ai vu pire!


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## Weston (Jul 11, 2008)

I suppose it's a generational thing, but you folks are only embarrassed by 70s fashion because you weren't there. Likewise I wouldn't have been caught dead back then with a classical cover showing performers from the 40s or 50s with way too much makeup, greased back or freaky curled hair, ties too thin, etc. But if you take the 80s - now those fashions were so unforgivable no one liked them even at the time.


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## Weston (Jul 11, 2008)

Based on a sidetracked discussion on the Current Listening thread, one of Blair's selections reminded me about theses Rozsa covers I truly dislike. They don't seem to evoke his music to me at all.


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## apricissimus (May 15, 2013)

To add to the many Shostakovich posts in this thread:


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## TurnaboutVox (Sep 22, 2013)

Weston said:


> I suppose it's a generational thing, but you folks are only embarrassed by 70s fashion because you weren't there.


I was so there! But you're right, it is a generational thing, it reminds me of my teachers etc.

In the case of the Melos Quartet picture it was less the fashions, more the 'why have they been portrayed holding umbrellas, and what is the connection to the art of Debussy and Ravel?' angle I was commenting on. Did they just happen to be 'snapped' by a passing photographer on the way to the recording venue and decide to use the resulting picture?


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## Blancrocher (Jul 6, 2013)

Anyone mentioned Arvo Part yet?

*p.s.* OK, I'll admit I kind of like that 3rd one.


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## Headphone Hermit (Jan 8, 2014)

Weston said:


> I suppose it's a generational thing, but you folks are only embarrassed by 70s fashion because you weren't there. Likewise I wouldn't have been caught dead back then with a classical cover showing performers from the 40s or 50s with way too much makeup, greased back or freaky curled hair, ties too thin, etc. But if you take the 80s - now those fashions were so unforgivable no one liked them even at the time.


er .... no, I WAS there and although I hate to admit it, I might even have dressed like that as well. THAT is why I'm embarassed by reminders of the errors of my ways

and a tie that is too thin? Really? Guess kipper ties are de rigour in some places, then?


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

He's just a small Part of a much larger picture.


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## StlukesguildOhio (Dec 25, 2006)

Then there's always this cover... so bad it's actually brilliant!



It's like a classic poster for a B-Horror/Sci-Fi film: The Mad Brain that Ate Mozart!

And a stunning recording to boot!


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Donata said:


> Cheesy Battlestar Galactica rejects, what's not to love?
> View attachment 33993


I think this one wax nominated as worst ever classical sleeve by the Gramophone.

Wonder what Adrian Boult, who conducted the featured performance thought of it? Just his street, I would think? (Not!)


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

StlukesguildOhio said:


> Then there's always this cover... so bad it's actually brilliant!
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Whatever the cover, the performance has never been equalled!


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## SimonNZ (Jul 12, 2012)

Weston said:


> I suppose it's a generational thing, but you folks are only embarrassed by 70s fashion because you weren't there. Likewise I wouldn't have been caught dead back then with a classical cover showing performers from the 40s or 50s with way too much makeup, greased back or freaky curled hair, ties too thin, etc. But if you take the 80s - now those fashions were so unforgivable no one liked them even at the time.


Its more that there seemed to be a stretch in the Seventies when the marketing department believed that wearing the latest casual fashions would make CM hip and now, or possibly less threatening. They must have realised pretty quickly it was only stripping it of gravitas and timelessness, so we were never subjected to string quartets in the Eighties sporting the "Miami Vice" look.


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## howemj (Jan 30, 2014)

Milton Babbitt? This one always makes me laugh.


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## SimonNZ (Jul 12, 2012)

But I do like this one:


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## Donata (Dec 28, 2013)

Janáček meets "What Does the Fox Say?"


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## elgar's ghost (Aug 8, 2010)

I think this one (same recording but different label, presumably) looks even more Andrew Lloyd Webber:

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images...__PJautoripBadge,BottomRight,4,-40_OU11__.jpg

Here's another one I recall - God knows what the relevance is here:

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51D71mZY+fL._SY450_.jpg

And a couple from Herbie vK's 'International Playboy Edition':

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images...__PJautoripBadge,BottomRight,4,-40_OU11__.jpg

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images...__PJautoripBadge,BottomRight,4,-40_OU11__.jpg


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## SimonNZ (Jul 12, 2012)

elgars ghost said:


> And a couple from Herbie vK's 'International Playboy Edition':


And more:

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/510jcaVRH9L._SY300_.jpg

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/517xaenWOtL._SY300_.jpg


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## mikey (Nov 26, 2013)

http://www.kusc.org/Blog/kusc/blogentry.aspx?BlogEntryID=10312566

Actually quite like the Planets one haha


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## Cosmos (Jun 28, 2013)

What is this supposed to be








what is this tower of terror








but why


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

^^^^These are not good. These are not good. These are not good.


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## TurnaboutVox (Sep 22, 2013)

I give you, in all seriousness, this...









So the appropriate image for Hindemith is a depressed cartoon duck!


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

^^This is quite bad! This is not good!


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## Blancrocher (Jul 6, 2013)

TurnaboutVox said:


> So the appropriate image for Hindemith is a depressed cartoon duck!


I blame Karttunen for this one.


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## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

I knew I still had this one lying around in my attachments pile...
Whether one wants to blame it on Debussy, Franck, Poulenc, Messiaen, Ravel, or the Gallic gene pool, it's a terrible cover.


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## TurnaboutVox (Sep 22, 2013)

Blancrocher said:


> I blame Karttunen for this one.


Ha! I got you (eventually!)









(A Karttune 'cellist)


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## mirepoix (Feb 1, 2014)

DavidA said:


> Yuja Wang's new Rach 3 has a portrait of her which is appalling.
> 
> http://www.deutschegrammophon.com/en/cat/4791304
> 
> She's quite a looker as well. How on earth someone devised this is beyond me!


I earn my living shooting photos. What's most obvious to me about that shot is the way it has been framed and cropped; I'm sure that being a one armed pianist isn't the image her management is trying to project.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

TurnaboutVox said:


> I give you, in all seriousness, this...
> 
> View attachment 34193
> 
> ...


Capture's Hindemith perfectly!


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