To the joy of the błøǧösphère, Timothy Mangan has returned to blogging, after the untimely demise of his previous site. He reprints a 2009 post titled "First Record," showing his first purchase as a record collector: Karajan's Bruckner Fourth. As it happens, my first purchase was Bruckner, too: a Vox Turnabout LP of Jascha Horenstein conducting the "Pro Musica Symphony, Vienna" (aka the Vienna Symphony) in the Symphony No. 9. I was all of ten when I bought the record, and had little idea of what the piece was about, but I did like the noise it made. Excited by my acquisition, I went to the trouble of typing up an information sheet, which has been tucked in the sleeve all these years. I struggled a bit with the movement titles; "Lebhoff" is not a typical marking in Bruckner.
Records & Tapes later became Olsson's Books and Records, a fine chain of stores in Washington DC. I spent untold hours at their Georgetown location, studying record jackets and arguing with the clerks. Sadly, Olsson's closed in 2008.
