To commemorate the bicentenary of the death of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (December 5, 1791) Philips Classics Records assembled The Complete Mozart Edition comprising 180 compact discs arranged into 45 themed volumes. Each volume in the series is accompanied by a deluxe booklet with detailed information about the works, with many illustrations. Indicating the significance of this particular series, the words of the accompanying Compactotheque state, "...after the complete Shakespeare, the complete Goethe, or the complete Molière in book form, here is the Complete Mozart on discs."
A modified version of The Complete Mozart Edition, the Complete Compact Mozart Edition, was released in 2000. It consists of 17 individual boxed sets. This version also contains stripped down versions of the booklets that accompanied the original series.
The Complete Mozart Edition and The Complete Compact Mozart Edition are both accompanied by a 200-page booklet which presents a condensed biography of Mozart with many photographs, describes in detail all boxes content and contains a complete index of all the musical works following the Köchel catalogue. This set is not to be confused with the similar complete edition on 170 CDs by Brilliant Classics.
In addition, a boxed set entitled The Best of the Complete Mozart Edition was also produced in 1995. This set contains 25 compact discs and represents a condensed version of the 1990–91 or 2000 sets.
There was a custom-made black cabinet supplied by mail order company Britannia Music Company (no longer in business) for those subscribing to the complete edition; the cabinet housed all 45 volumes and the sampler disc. The complete set with cabinet is now a very collectable item; they have sold for around the £1000 mark.
Read more about The Complete Mozart Edition: The Original The Complete Mozart Series, The Complete Compact Mozart Edition
Famous quotes containing the words complete, mozart and/or edition:
“A complete woman is probably not a very admirable creature. She is manipulative, uses other people to get her own way, and works within whatever system she is in.”
—Anita Brookner (b. 1938)
“Mozart has the classic purity of light and the blue ocean; Beethoven the romantic grandeur which belongs to the storms of air and sea, and while the soul of Mozart seems to dwell on the ethereal peaks of Olympus, that of Beethoven climbs shuddering the storm-beaten sides of a Sinai. Blessed be they both! Each represents a moment of the ideal life, each does us good. Our love is due to both.”
—Henri-Frédéric Amiel (1821–1881)
“Books have their destinies like men. And their fates, as made by generations of readers, are very different from the destinies foreseen for them by their authors. Gulliver’s Travels, with a minimum of expurgation, has become a children’s book; a new illustrated edition is produced every Christmas. That’s what comes of saying profound things about humanity in terms of a fairy story.”
—Aldous Huxley (1894–1963)