Va No. 1

“NO MUSIC, NO LIFE. TOWER RECORDS 40th ANNIVERSARY” was compiled to commemorate the 40th anniversary of Tower Records. Here we select 40 gems that Tower Records buyers love over time and genres. The target age is not limited to the last 40 years, but since 1960 when Tower Records was founded in the United States. From Elvis Presley's “I can't help but like it” (1961) to Sam Smith's “Stay with me” (2013).

The labels that are now gathered under the Universal Classics umbrella have a pretty impressive scorecard in the area of classical compilations. We've seen The Greatest Opera Show on Earth, The Yellow Guide: Classical Music, Best of the Millennium, and now there's The No. 1 Opera Album. But that's no surprise, since Universal has some of the finest interpreters in its catalogue to draw from. This two-CD set (at the price of one), for example, brings together the likes of Cecilia Bartoli, Renée Fleming, Luciano Pavarotti, Kiri Te Kanawa, Sir Georg Solti, Herbert von Karajan, and many more. Yet the other key to a successful compilation is canny anthologizing, and here again, you have a nice selection to give you a smattering of opera's heavyweights from the Italian, German, and French repertory (there's even a step outside the standard framework with an aria from Dvorák's lovely Rusalka). Ranging from 1959 to 1997, the choices from back catalogue will doubtless be the entry ticket for many into this grandest of the arts.