FREE/BARGAIN — Media Deals (non-eBook/non-audiobook)

[GtrsRGr8]

The Monday-Friday string of free classical music pieces from YourClassical begins, today, with an Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart piece, Symphony No. 28: IV. Presto.

This particular rendition comes from a Naxos album called Mozart - Symphony No. 40 in G Minor - Symphonies Nos. 31 "Paris" and 28.

YourClassical really dug deep into their music vault this time--the album was recorded way back in 1988. The music on the entire album is performed by Capella Istropolitana, with Barry Wordsworth as conductor. As usual (always?), when a piece from a Naxos album is featured on YourClassical, there is a dedicated Naxos webpage for information about the album. You can find additional information about the album to what I've given above, by pointing your browser to here.

To either stream the free piece or to download it, or to do both, you need go only to only one webpage. There's a stream bar on the webpage, and also a "Direct MP3 download link" link.

I find Mozart's works to be a little too lively for me most of the time. This one is by no means serene, but does not seem to be quite as lively as other Mozart pieces that I've heard. I liked it. This free piece was a definite download for me.

Circumstances permitting, I'll post tomorrow's YourClassical freebie.

[GtrsRGr8]

Well, I still haven't heard from Naxos regarding the problem that some people (including yours truly) have had downloading albums from their second promotion (the ones with the FLAC albums) of the month. But life moves on . . . .

Alexander Street's newest free tracks, which they offer biweekly, are available now. Or, at least, most of them are. I have run into a glitch that prevents me from downloading the first of the four tracks that they're giving away this time. I don't know if this is a problem with me/my computer or if the problem lies with the source.

First, the details of the giveaway:
This week's download features Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 6, "Pathétique." This is the last symphony that Tchaikovsky wrote, quickly drafted in early 1893 (five years after he finished his fifth symphony) but not completed until August of that year. Tchaikovsky conducted its premiere in St. Petersburg on October 16, 1893, just days before his sudden death. This recording is performed by the Orquesta Filarmónica De La Ciudad de México under the direction of Fernando Lozano.

These are the four free tracks. I assume that they constitute the entirety of Symphony No. 6, "Pathétique."
I. Adagio - Allegro non troppo
II. Allegro con grazia
III. Allegro molto vivace
IV. Finale - Adagio lamentoso

These are all provided as MP3's.

I think that, if you are already signed up to receive Alexander Street's freebies, you might be able to navigate to this webpage to get the downloads. There should be a bright blue "Download" button on Tchaikovsky's photo that is impossible to miss. Click on it. That should take you to a webpage which has the links to the free pieces. They're in blue and found inside the aqua blue box near the top of the page.

Now, here is a second glitch. Again, I don't know if the problem lies with me/my computer or if the trouble lies with the source. But the procedure that I gave you in the previous paragraph is not working for me. When I click on the "Download" button, I get stuff connected with the previous Alexander Street giveaway. If it doesn't work for you, either, try going directly to the webpage with the download links. That was what I had to do. If for some reason you do not get the webpage, try using this longer URL.

Now, whenever and however you get to the webpage with the download links, you may find, like I found, that you will not be able to save the first track. That's the one for 1.Adagio - Allegro non troppo. I tried with two different browsers, and neither gave the desired results.

This new offer just came out in the last couple of hours. If the cause of one or more of the two glitches lies(?) with the source, Alexander Street may become aware of it/them soon and fix it/them. I will check again tomorrow, and let you know what I find out.

Despite the chaos, I did get to listen to the three downloadable tracks. The pieces are very nice--there is a reason that Tchaikovsky is a famous composer! I do hope that we can get the first track, and without the hassle that we've had with another music publisher, whose name I won't mention here.

Oh yeah, if you are not a subscriber to Alexander Street's announcements of new giveaways, you may need to become one, and may then need to log in, in order to receive the downloads. At least, you will need to sign up in order to get announcements every time new downloads are available. You can sign up by going to this webpage, and scrolling down about one screen. Alexander Street markets to institutions (like libraries and such) and the form that you need to complete reflects that. Just make sure that you put something in each form field (for example, I put "MobileRead.com" for the "Institution").

Posting free classical music isn't my "job," but if it was I would feel very unqualified for it.

[GtrsRGr8]

YourClassical has another Mozart piece as their freebie of the day today.

Granted, Mozart was a prolific composer, but it still seemed unusual to get two free Mozart pieces in a row. Coincidence, maybe? Curious, I checked Wikipedia and noticed that his birthday is this week. Perhaps that is the reason for the Mozart pieces. If so, we may have a Mozart-A-Thon on our hands, with pieces from him for the rest of the week, because his birthday is still several days away.

The piece comes from a Naxos album, once again. The album is Mozart: String Quartets, K. 172-173 and K. 575, 'Prussian No. 1'. The dedicated webpage for the album is here. The Eder Quartet is the ensemble credited with the performances on the album.

The particular piece from the album that YourClassical offers free to us today is String Quartet No. 21 "Prussian": II. Andante. I liked the piece. But, I generally like stringed instruments (all the way up (or down, depending upon your feelings) to the electric guitar. ha). Much of Mozart's work is very lively, this piece was subdued--also a plus in my book.

You can download the free MP3 from this webpage. Click on the "Direct MP3 download link." From the same webpage, you can stream the piece, also, should that be your desire.

Should this be of interest to you for any reason, the free piece is 4 minutes, 28 seconds long.

[GtrsRGr8]

I am interested in hearing any responses by people to the Alexander Street giveaway. Whether you did or did not experience one or more of the glitches that I encountered, would you please let me know that somehow?

Thanks.

[GtrsRGr8]

I call this day of the month "Super Tuesday," because the freebies from all of the providers are offered on, or close to, this day. Classical-music.com's newest free weekly download has been posted. It is 'There is Sweet Music,' by composer Edward Elgar.

Unfortunately, I am going to be limited in how much information that I can give you. When I was clearing my cache and doing some other cleaning up on my browser, in order to try to get the Naxos download to work, I must have cleaned up too much, because the user names and passwords that were automatically filled in for me on websites no longer appear. And I don't see anywhere on the log in webpage an "if you forgot your username or password, click here" kind of thing. I'm going to have to work on that later. Arrghh!

Anyway, here is the blurb for the Classical-music.com freebie:
This week's free download is 'There is Sweet Music', the first of Four Part Songs by Edward Elgar, performed by Tenebrae and conducted by Nigel Short. The recording was Choral and Song Choice in the Christmas issue of BBC Music Magazine.

'Tenebrae sings with delicate sentience,' writes Terry Blain, 'the pulse and phrasing of the musical lines determined by a refined attention to words and meaning.'

I remember that to get the freebie you have to have signed up to get them. Then, to get a particular download, you must be logged in. For this week's freebie, go to this webpage. There should be a red button (I think that it says "Download") that is superimposed on the thumbnail image of the album cover. Click on it, and you're on your way.

I'm almost certain that the download is an MP3.

I can barely make out, from the thumbnail image that I mentioned above, that the title of the album is Music of the Spheres - Past Songs of the British Isles.

[GtrsRGr8]

I don't like to make a post when there is no news, but I think that I need to keep you guys informed--I still haven't heard from Naxos about the problem that I and others have had downloading their most recent FLAC album offers.

I'll try to be open-minded, and think that they're working on the problem and that it still will be fixed.

[GtrsRGr8]

Originally Posted by GtrsRGr8

I am interested in hearing any responses by people to the Alexander Street giveaway. Whether you did or did not experience one or more of the glitches that I encountered, would you please let me know that somehow?

Thanks.

They must have fixed the issue, because I was able, just now, to download the first piece.

[GtrsRGr8]

The second problem that I had with the Alexander Street downloads--the "Download" button sending me to a webpage with information about the previous free download offer--appears to have been fixed.

Naxos, can you follow their good example?

[koland]

Originally Posted by GtrsRGr8

I am interested in hearing any responses by people to the Alexander Street giveaway. Whether you did or did not experience one or more of the glitches that I encountered, would you please let me know that somehow?

Thanks.

Had same problems as you, but they are indeed fixed and I downloaded the missing piece (and one of the three available I was having trouble getting completed here on a slow network).

[GtrsRGr8]

Originally Posted by koland

Had same problems as you, but they are indeed fixed and I downloaded the missing piece (and one of the three available I was having trouble getting completed here on a slow network).

A slow network in Knoxville? A technology hub. Home of the University of Tennessee, which has a reputation for technology and engineering (my uncle, from near Oak Ridge, got his Bachelor's in Engineering at Purdue (big engineering school--the "Boilermakers") and then chose to get his Master's at U.T. This, of course, was a long time ago, too), home of the World's Fair, in 198_?, which was focused on energy, with that big tower thingie as the focal point. That Knoxville?

Frankly, concerning the problems that I had at Alexander Street, one or both may have been of my own making. I checked the website for changes and noticed a fresh download page--figured everything was good to go. Then, today, I got an email from them notifying me of the new download. I need to be more patient next time--after all, the download is good for two weeks. Now, Naxos is a different matter . . . .

Oh, and thanks for responding to my query to all MobileReaders about their Alexander Street experience(s). You were the only one who responded--well, except for me, and I don't count.

[GtrsRGr8]

Mozart-A-Thon continues at YourClassical with another Mozart free piece, today. This is third straight day at YourClassical with a Mozart giveaway. I surmised yesterday, after we had gotten two of them in a row, that we may have them the whole week. The 27th, I think that it is, is Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's birthday.

Today we can get an MP3 of Requiem: Agnus Dei. As performed, it runs 2 minutes, 20 seconds.

One of the performers of the album is the Gewandhaus Chamber Choir. There is choral singing on the free piece, so it is presumably from that choir. Leipzig Chamber Orchestra is also credited with performances on the album, and Morten Schuldt-Jensen gets the nod for directing, as conductor.

The free piece comes from a Naxos album called Mozart - Requiem. There is a lot of human interest matter associated with the album. On the dedicated Naxos webpage for the album, Naxos says:
At his premature death in the early hours of 5th December, 1791, Mozart left his final masterpiece unfinished and shrouded in mystery. It had been commissioned by a ‘grey messenger’ whose ghostly apparition convinced the sick and impoverished composer that he was being told to write his own musical epitaph. This and the myth of his being poisoned by the jealous Salieri became the stuff of legend in the 19th century, and inspired an opera, a play and a film in the twentieth century. The Requiem remains one of the most personal, impassioned and profound of Mozart’s works.

So, you will be hearing one of the last pieces that Mozart composed!

The piece is beautiful. If you don't want to take my word for it, take the free piece on a test drive before downloading it, by navigating to this webpage and clicking on the appropriate place on the stream bar. Not commitment-phobic, and ready to download? Navigate to the same webpage, and click on "Direct MP3 download link." It does exactly what it suggests--clicking on that link immediately starts the download to the place where you have such things set up to go to.

[GtrsRGr8]

Again, I don't like to make posts of no news, but I still haven't heard from Naxos concerning the download issue(s) concerning their most recent FLAC offerings.

On a related subject, I received an automated message from Naxos wanting me to rate their customer service. Anybody want to weigh in? If so, I'll send them a composite answer, from the ratings that you guys suggest.

[KyBunnies]

Originally Posted by GtrsRGr8

Again, I don't like to make posts of no news, but I still haven't heard from Naxos concerning the download issue(s) concerning their most recent FLAC offerings.

On a related subject, I received an automated message from Naxos wanting me to rate their customer service. Anybody want to weigh in? If so, I'll send them a composite answer, from the ratings that you guys suggest.

Most of the time when you receive an email asking to rate customer service the ticket has been closed. If you received a confirmation email with a link then I would suggest you click the link and see if the ticket is closed. If so then I would rate customer service as zero.

[GtrsRGr8]

Originally Posted by KyBunnies

Most of the time when you receive an email asking to rate customer service the ticket has been closed. If you received a confirmation email with a link then I would suggest you click the link and see if the ticket is closed. If so then I would rate customer service as zero.

Thanks.

And, ha!, r.e. the zero comment. I appreciate Naxos' giveaways, but the favorable impression that I had of them has certainly waned considerably since this issue came up.

[GtrsRGr8]

Good News. I finally heard from Naxos and they said that they had put the album that I chose in a zip file (like they said they would) in Dropbox. Unless there is another glitch preventing me from opening and listening to the album, that will be all that I will say about the matter from here on.


ADDENDUM: Oh, I should have mentioned that the representative, Ms Saquing, did apologize for the delay in sending it.