[mb-style] Classical releases titles should be sleeves' title or reflect the whole content of release ?

[Dave Smey]

On Fri, October 20, 2006 2:23 pm, mll said:

> Frenquently, while a classical CD bears several works, only one is
> featured
> on the sleeve.
>
> Example: http://amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B000027O4P whose sleeve only
> mentions Bach's magnificat while ther's also a cantate in it.
>
> So what should the title be, 1) "J.S. Bach: Magnificat" as per the sleeve,
> or something like 2) "Magnificat BWV 243 / Cantate BWV 80" ?
>
> My take would be that, often a release may bear different sleeves with
> different titles according to the country where it's released, or the date
> of re-release, so I think choice 2 is better.
>
I'd go with #2 also.  I'd make the fairly extreme argument that "Classical
releases often don't have real titles."  There is a bit in the wiki
somewhere that acknowledges that the title is basically an inventory of
the pieces.

Things I've observed that suggest this:

Sometimes, in an effort to find the "real" title, you see that the spine
and the cover don't match at all.

Labels sometimes can't be bothered to match their cover design to the
metadata on their website / digital release.  BIS is particularly bad
about this - sometimes they will release a recital which seems to have a
special title (like Alexei Lubimov (pianist): "Pourquoi je suis si
sentimental" on the cover) and then call it a completely different thing
online ("Post-War Avant-Garde Piano Music.")  But that could just be
attributed to industry sloppiness.

So #2 can be considered better for practical reasons because it alerts you
to the presence of that Cantata, in case you are looking for it.

And, if I can be so bold as to suggest "how Classical buyers think" once
again, people mostly don't remember these generic classical titles or
search for them.  At least I don't - I look for "the recording with (blah
person) playing (blah piece) on (blah label.)"  If I'm doing an album
title seach, it is just in the hopes that the piece I want is in the album
title.

-DS