# Warning about Spotify screwups



## Becca (Feb 5, 2015)

Today I was listening to the Sawallisch/EMI _Meistersinger_ on Spotify and was in the middle of act 3 scene 4 just after Sachs cuffs David when suddenly it skipped to the start of scene 5, missing the entire quintet! Looking at the Spotify track listings I could see that it was indeed missing, not just a problem with my connection. This reminded me of a problem I encountered some months ago when listening to the Callas _Carmen_ when suddenly in the middle of act 1 (I think, don't remember for sure now), all of a sudden I found myself listening to some Mozart for about 3 minutes, then back to Carmen! I carefully check and sure enough, that one track was pointing to the wrong place. In the case of the _Carmen_, there were two different pressings listed, an EMI and Warner, and the other was correct. In the case of _Meistersinger_, there is no other copy of that version that I can see.

The moral of the story: for $10/month you get what you paid for!

Back to the Solti/Vienna recording. I like Ben Heppner but Norman Bailey as Sachs is terrific.


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## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

Thank goodness for small mercies, like having a decent CD player or even a even more old fashioned; turntable :tiphat:


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## Haydn man (Jan 25, 2014)

I have had a similar experience last year with some Schubert Symphonies with Minkowski, if memory serves my right.
Not really surprising that there is the odd error out there with streaming services, given the size of the catalogue.
Overall for the money £10 ($15) in the UK, I still think it is excellent value for money and has introduced me to music I would otherwise not have heard.


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## Figleaf (Jun 10, 2014)

Becca said:


> Today I was listening to the Sawallisch/EMI _Meistersinger_ on Spotify and was in the middle of act 3 scene 4 just after Sachs cuffs David when suddenly it skipped to the start of scene 5, missing the entire quintet! Looking at the Spotify track listings I could see that it was indeed missing, not just a problem with my connection. This reminded me of a problem I encountered some months ago when listening to the Callas _Carmen_ when suddenly in the middle of act 1 (I think, don't remember for sure now), all of a sudden I found myself listening to some Mozart for about 3 minutes, then back to Carmen! I carefully check and sure enough, that one track was pointing to the wrong place. In the case of the _Carmen_, there were two different pressings listed, an EMI and Warner, and the other was correct. In the case of _Meistersinger_, there is no other copy of that version that I can see.
> 
> The moral of the story: for $10/month you get what you paid for!
> 
> Back to the Solti/Vienna recording. I like Ben Heppner but Norman Bailey as Sachs is terrific.


So when you listen for free you get interrupted by adverts, but when you pay $10 you get interrupted by Mozart?  Thanks for the warning- this technophobe will probably stick with the more user friendly YouTube, where last time I looked the Callas Carmen was still available intact.


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## MagneticGhost (Apr 7, 2013)

Figleaf said:


> So when you listen for free you get interrupted by adverts, but when you pay $10 you get interrupted by Mozart?  Thanks for the warning- this technophobe will probably stick with the more user friendly YouTube, where last time I looked the Callas Carmen was still available intact.


YT is all well and good but the quality is definitely sub.
Spotify premium allows for streaming and syncing at 320 which is as good as CD quality to my ears. I notice a definite lack of fidelity, warmth and depth on anything I listen to on YT.
I'm a big Spotify fan and despite it's occasional shortcomings feel it's well worth the outlay. (Although I'm not paying at mo cos I got 2 years free premium with iPhone upgrade.)


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## Figleaf (Jun 10, 2014)

MagneticGhost said:


> YT is all well and good but the quality is definitely sub.
> Spotify premium allows for streaming and syncing at 320 which is as good as CD quality to my ears. I notice a definite lack of fidelity, warmth and depth on anything I listen to on YT.
> I'm a big Spotify fan and despite it's occasional shortcomings feel it's well worth the outlay. (Although I'm not paying at mo cos I got 2 years free premium with iPhone upgrade.)


Ah, I see. The speakers are too tinny on my laptop and tablet for me to perceive the difference. The other advantage of YouTube over Spotify that I'm aware of (though I may well be wrong again) is that there are youtube downloaders like Videoder which allow you to listen offline thus eliminating buffering, whereas I don't think there's an equivalent for Spotify? This may not be an issue for you since you like to stream music, so presumably you have good speakers and decent broadband (though don't the kids take up most if it playing video games and streaming cartoons- sorry, doing homework? )


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## MagneticGhost (Apr 7, 2013)

Spotify Premium does allow you to 'sync' to your device or PC. This allows you to listen even when not connected. Thus I can fill up my phone as an iPod or Walkman and listen to fave music or new albums on my dog walks. And I've never had any trouble with buffering when just streaming to be honest. Even before we went fibre optic. 
But interested to know you can do similar with YT too. Didn't know that.


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## Figleaf (Jun 10, 2014)

MagneticGhost said:


> Spotify Premium does allow you to 'sync' to your device or PC. This allows you to listen even when not connected. Thus I can fill up my phone as an iPod or Walkman and listen to fave music or new albums on my dog walks. And I've never had any trouble with buffering when just streaming to be honest. Even before we went fibre optic.
> But interested to know you can do similar with YT too. Didn't know that.


Yes, even clueless people (me) can download from YouTube, though it may not be strictly legal (?) Syncing to devices sounds promising, though currently beyond my limited IT abilities!


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## MagneticGhost (Apr 7, 2013)

Honest you don't need IT skills to use Spotify. And there are other streaming services on the market now that offer similar: Amazon Prime and Google Play. And lots of these offer free trials. 

Spotify free is absolute rubbish for Classical music though - unless you like ads playing sporadically throughout your operas and symphonies


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## Figleaf (Jun 10, 2014)

MagneticGhost said:


> Honest you don't need IT skills to use Spotify. And there are other streaming services on the market now that offer similar: Amazon Prime and Google Play. And lots of these offer free trials.
> 
> Spotify free is absolute rubbish for Classical music though - unless you like ads playing sporadically throughout your operas and symphonies


It's the loudness of the ads relative to the music that bothers me even more than the frequency- the same goes for TV, which I no longer watch. Good to know that IT skills are not required for the premium version of Spotify though.


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## Wood (Feb 21, 2013)

MagneticGhost said:


> Spotify Premium does allow you to 'sync' to your device or PC. This allows you to listen even when not connected. Thus I can fill up my phone as an iPod or Walkman and listen to fave music or new albums on my dog walks. And I've never had any trouble with buffering when just streaming to be honest. Even before we went fibre optic.
> *But interested to know you can do similar with YT too*. Didn't know that.


On Linux it is very easy with the youtube-dl package. Just open a terminal and type "youtube-dl " and paste the URL of the video you want, and it is saved in the Home directory. It is great for dealing with films and operas which have buffering problems on bad broadband days.


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## Becca (Feb 5, 2015)

Pugg said:


> Thank goodness for small mercies, like having a decent CD player or even a even more old fashioned; turntable :tiphat:


Wow what a coincidence, I have one of them also!


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## Becca (Feb 5, 2015)

Haydn man said:


> I have had a similar experience last year with some Schubert Symphonies with Minkowski, if memory serves my right.
> Not really surprising that there is the odd error out there with streaming services, given the size of the catalogue.
> Overall for the money £10 ($15) in the UK, I still think it is excellent value for money and has introduced me to music I would otherwise not have heard.


I totally agree. And, as in this case, it lets me try out different versions.


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## Becca (Feb 5, 2015)

Wood said:


> On Linux it is very easy with the youtube-dl package. Just open a terminal and type "youtube-dl " and paste the URL of the video you want, and it is saved in the Home directory. It is great for dealing with films and operas which have buffering problems on bad broadband days.


For Linux there is also 'spotify-ripper' which uses a Spotify provide API for downloading, although it is supposedly deprecated.


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## ribonucleic (Aug 20, 2014)

MagneticGhost said:


> YT is all well and good but the quality is definitely sub.


Sometimes you get lucky. Depending on when the video was uploaded and with what resolution, you might get as much as 192 kbps AAC.

http://www.h3xed.com/web-and-internet/youtube-audio-quality-bitrate-240p-360p-480p-720p-1080p

You would need better ears and/or better headphones than I have to reliably distinguish that from lossless.


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## ribonucleic (Aug 20, 2014)

Figleaf said:


> Yes, even clueless people (me) can download from YouTube, though it may not be strictly legal (?)


It's certainly a violation of Section 5B of YT's Terms of Service.



> You shall not download any Content unless you see a "download" or similar link displayed by YouTube on the Service for that Content.


https://www.youtube.com/static?template=terms

But to the best of my recollection, even when the RIAA was trying to sue individual people, they went after uploaders - not downloaders.


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## Badinerie (May 3, 2008)

Spotify is ok for auditioning music or the odd pop song. I couldnt imagine using it as a main listening option ad free or otherwise.
But im part of the old geezer generation. 

Hang on a minute...when did that happen!?


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## ribonucleic (Aug 20, 2014)

Badinerie said:


> im part of the old geezer generation.
> 
> Hang on a minute...when did that happen!?


On another board, I once asked people to nominate the best songs to lead off Side 2 of their album.

The community politely explained to me that, having grown up in the CD era or later, "Side 2" wasn't something they dealt with.


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## isorhythm (Jan 2, 2015)

As far as I'm concerned Spotify premium is absolutely worth it. I can download all the music I want onto my phone and listen on the subway.

But yes, there are problems. Sound quality is one. Even with the 320 kbps there are flaws, particularly with high pitches, which I don't think are caused by digital compression but by some other technical problem on their end. The service is clearly designed for other genres more than for classical; searching for classical albums is sometimes difficult.

I still buy CDs, and this is where Spotify really comes in handy: I almost never read reviews anymore. I just listen for myself before buying.


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## Guest (Jan 17, 2016)

ribonucleic said:


> On another board, I once asked people to nominate the best songs to lead off Side 2 of their album.
> 
> The community politely explained to me that, having grown up in the CD era or later, "Side 2" wasn't something they dealt with.


Eh? Not even when they need to get the fluff off the needle?


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## Becca (Feb 5, 2015)

ribonucleic said:


> On another board, I once asked people to nominate the best songs to lead off Side 2 of their album.
> 
> The community politely explained to me that, having grown up in the CD era or later, "Side 2" wasn't something they dealt with.


Sides? My Edison cylinders don't have sides! (OK, inside and outside, but still!)


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## OldFashionedGirl (Jul 21, 2013)

I almost always listen classical music on Spotify. I prefer CDs, but because of my economical condition I can't buys cd regularly. I had no problems with Spotify so far. I use my dad's premium account, and by means of an apparatus I listen Spotify on the stereo. It sounds better than listening in the computer, though still lacks the quality of a cd.


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## mountmccabe (May 1, 2013)

I tend to stream Spotify from an old smartphone or the Roku to my stereo so that I can listen via good speakers. It has really revolutionized how I listen to music, with so many options available! I am certainly someone that wants to listen to different works all the time, as well as different performances of those works.


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## mountmccabe (May 1, 2013)

But yes, there are some tracks and albums that don't play well in Spotify.

There are two versions of the 1997 Naxos release _German Operatic Choruses_. On both of them the Sailor's Chorus from _Der fliegende Holländer_ skips. There may be other tracks that skip, but I don't recall which ones.

This one has the Huntsman's Chorus from _Der Freischütz_ as the fifth track (length is 2:36). This other one that fifth track is 10:02 long, and it says it is the Huntsman's Chorus but it is actually "Casta diva," which the astute reader will notice is neither in German nor primarily for chorus (though the track goes on long enough that there is some of the following choral part).

The performance is by Marina Mescheriakova and the Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra from a 2004 CD, Soprano Arias.

And now I want to hear a "Casta diva" translated to German and arranged for chorus.


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## mountmccabe (May 1, 2013)

A couple years ago the Spotify desktop client had a way to report errors like these to them. I reported a CD labeled as Rafael Kubelík conducting the Vienna Philharmonic in Antonín Dvořák's 2nd symphony in B-flat that was actually his 7th symphony in d.

I thought they took it down at the time, but it appears to be back in the system (though unplayable in my region (the United States)). It is still labeled as Symphony 2. It also says it is opus 10 (which is his third symphony, his second is opus 4) and says it is in d, so it is a mess all around.

This is the same recording, labeled as Symphony 7.


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## Arsakes (Feb 20, 2012)

What's Spotify? Is it edible? Never heard of it.


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