Update from Building a Classical Music Collection

Join me on this musical journey.

Dear Subscribers and Readers,

First, I don’t say enough how much I appreciate all of you subscribers for your support. It means the world to me. I also very much appreciate those of that take the time to send messages with feedback, as I highly value your input as I try to continuously improve my writing and my reviews.

Building a Classical Music Collection is for readers that are interested in learning more about classical music, and about the best audio (and sometimes video) recordings available. Full disclosure, I am not a music professional, nor do I play music as an amateur. My primary source of knowledge and experience comes from teaching myself about composers, conductors, soloists, ensembles, and specific pieces of classical music. A big part of that is the extensive listening to and collecting recordings I’ve done for the past 35 years, as well as taking every opportunity to attend live classical music concerts.

It is important for you to know that my writing is “long form”, meaning it tends to be longer, more in depth, and relatively detailed. Therefore, many of my posts are on the longer side, much as I try to condense the content.

Currently my writing on Substack is comprised of three different ongoing series:

Building a Collection

The Building a Collection series is an ambitious project covering the top 250 classical works of all-time. Currently the series has covered the top 88 works, with #89 Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis coming soon. The Building a Collection series is free to all readers.

The Best New Classical Albums of 2025

This series explores new releases in classical music, specifically the best of the new albums from my own listening sessions. So far in 2025 I have featured 21 new albums that are more than worthy of exploration, and my goal is to publish a review of a new album every 1-2 weeks. This series is exclusive to paid subscribers.

The Top 75 Conductors

In this series I am profiling the lives, careers, and recordings of the top 75 conductors of all-time in classical music. I am going down the list in alphabetical order, and thus far I have made it through 18 conductors (at #18 was Antal Doráti and next time at #19 I will profile Gustavo Dudamel). This series is also exclusive to paid subscribers.

If this sounds interesting, I hope you will consider joining me on this journey of discovery as a free or paid subscriber.

Additional updates

First, I have been visiting family and traveling these past several days, and I am currently behind in my writing. I ask for your patience as I complete work on Gustavo Dudamel and then Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis. The Missa Solemnis in particular is a bit of a daunting task to cover. You may be interested to know writing is not my primary job, much as I would love it to be. But rest assured I will be posting again soon.

Second, I promised myself when I reached 1K subscribers I would begin using the “Notes” feature on Substack, and possibly other tools offered by Substack. Currently I am sitting at 940 subscribers. While I certainly have mixed feelings about using the Notes function, I am also excited at the possibility of reaching a larger audience. Stay tuned.

Finally, I am watching developments at Substack in terms of ownership changes and policies given the political climate in the United States and around the world. If Substack implements any policies which limit freedom of speech or which censor content in any way, I will immediately explore moving my content to a different platform on principle. I am not particularly knowledgeable about technology, and thus far Substack has been ideal for what I do. But if that changes, I will do what I need to do. Again, stay tuned.

That’s it for now. Again, I am grateful for all of you, and I wish you all the best in the week ahead. Take care.