Bath Farmers’ Market takes place on Saturday mornings. The market stalls stand next to other stalls which are there all week, including one that sells second-hand DVDs and CDs. Among the latter there is a small selection of classical ones, changing every week, mostly on sale for £4 a CD or box.
The repertoire on these classical CDs is not, for the most part, the usual sort of compilation of ‘hundred best tunes’ or even complete popular works. Whatever source they have is especially strong on 20th-century American repertoire and obscure operas; so for example I’ve recently seen Edward Thomas’ Desire under the Elms, Marschner’s Der Vampyr and Verdi’s La battaglia di Legnano. A couple of weeks ago I picked up Colin Davis conducting Les Troyens, and last week there was a bargain-basement pile priced at £1 each from which we selected Stravinsky ballets (Apollon musagète/Agon/Orpheus), Bartók piano concertos, Bruckner’s string quintet, a box of unreconstructed 1960’s recordings of Vivaldi concertos and Joan Sutherland singing Adriana Lecouvreur. And back they come in the shopping basket alongside the olives, bacon and bottles of apple juice.