[78-L] Record of Singing

[Stewart, Joseph R]

Early in 1978 I managed to score a copy of Vol.1 (RLS-724, the one in the red box with a portrait of Adelina Patti on the cover) at, of all places, Peaches in Tulsa--well, they did have a huge classical section in those days.  And it was mispriced at something like $54.95 or $57.95... I kept the Peaches price sticker from the shrink wrap (it's at home, I'll have to check the exact price)!  
     But Mike Biel is right--the "bottom dropped out" on the resale value of RLS-724 long ago.  There were numerous complaints about certain tracks being mastered at the wrong playback speeds... what was it, something like 15 to 20 percent of the total contents?  As the late J.B. Steane wrote in "Gramophone" November 1982 when the reissue sets (see below) came out, " gradually it came to be realized that this very notable achievement was in fact rather seriously flawed."  Anyway, in 1982 EMI tried to put it to rights with the budget-price reissue "A Record of Singers" in two 6-LP boxes, RLS-7705 & 7706 (the original was one 12-disc box) along with a single supplementary LP (HLM-7264) of singers the original collector/producers, George Stuart and Vivian Liff, didn't include first time around--and some different discs that reissue producer Keith Hardwick thought "better represented" some of the original singers.  The one thing the reissue DIDN'T include was the Michael Scott book that came with the original set.
     Last price I found for the original RLS-724 on Popsike was an eBay sale in 2008 -- it went for $103.00 (minimum bid was $50).  By the way, the four-CD "Very Best of Volumes 1-4" that EMI released three years ago is pretty much a hatchet job.

Randy Stewart
Arts Producer
KSMU
901 S. National
Springfield MO 65897