WAGNER Der Ring Des Nibelungen 14-LP Box FURTWANGLER, RAI Rome – 1953 recording

$

25

 •Composer: Wagner

 •Performers: Soloists & Rome Symphony Orchestra of RAI, Wilhelm Furtwängler
 •Album Title: Der Ring Des Nibelungen (The Ring of the Nibelung)
 •Format: 14-LP Box Set
 •Label: Seraphim
 •Country and Year of Release: USA? (but pressed in Germany), 1986
 •Box/Record Grade: Ex/See Other Info!
 •Other Info: Remastered from the original master tapes.  Great, historical recording from 1953.  Comes with 104-page libretto.  Sorry, but I’m not going to assign a specific grade to fourteen records.  But I will say that all them, except for the first two, are in the high Excellent to Mint range, almost all of them the latter (for more info on my grading system, see “Grading Information” below).  About the first two LPs: the previous owner of this set managed to put two scratches into the first side of the first LP.  These are at the beginning, and affect parts of maybe the first ten minutes or so.  Just for good measure, he then put a, blessedly, smaller scratch on side three (on the second LP) that affects about four minutes of play.  Happily, after this he apparently lost interest in the Ring, because all the other records appear to be unplayed and are in the condition stated above.

Payment and Shipping Information

In the U.S., shipping/handling is $4.98 for one LP sent by Media Mail (but if this listing is for more than one LP, click on the Shipping and Payments tab above for the correct price).  Package insured upon request.  Yes, I do combine shipping so if you purchase more than one item, you WILL save on postage!  I do not gouge on postage and packaging costs.  I send your records to you carefully packaged in a strong, OVERSIZED LP mailer (to avoid damage to the LP cover) with sturdy cardboard squares (to protect the record and the cover), but I make sure to only charge the amount needed to cover my actual costs.  If you have any questions about this item, feel free to contact me. 

International Customers: Please do not use the Checkout (Pay Now) option if you are paying for more than one item, or you may end up paying more for postage than is necessary, as eBay tends to calculate shipping and handling on the high side. Instead, wait for me to send you an invoice with the correct total amount due. I will do my best to contact you within one day of the auction’s end.  An approximate cost for one LP to many countries is $20.45 by First Class Package International Mail (but Canada and Mexico will be less than this).  To find a more accurate quote for shipping/handling to your country (or if this listing is for more than one LP), go to the Shipping and Payments tab above and select your country from the list.  Yes, I do combine shipping so if you purchase more than one item, you WILL save on postage!  I do not gouge on postage and packaging costs.  I send your records to you carefully packaged in a strong, OVERSIZED LP mailer (to avoid damage to the LP cover) with sturdy cardboard squares (to protect the record and the cover), but I make sure to only charge the amount needed to cover my actual costs.  If you have any questions about this item, feel free to contact me.

Grading Information

With very few exceptions, I play grade the records that I list.  (This means that I don't go by the way a record looks, only by how it plays.)  Sometimes when I have a group (or a “lot”) of LPs within a single listing, I will not play all the records, but this is fairly rare.

I use Mint (M), Excellent (Ex), Very Good (VG), Good (G), Fair (F), and (heaven help us) Poor (P), and I take each of these words at their literal meaning.  In other words, if I assign an LP a grade of “G,” that means to me that it really is in good playing condition, not fair or worse—for many dealers, a G (or even VG) grade is often really nothing more than a euphemism for a record that is in fair or poor condition.

I also use up to three plus signs (+) and up to three minus signs (-) to indicate varying degrees within a specific grade.  So, a grade letter followed by a “+” means the condition is slightly better than the grade letter by itself, and a grade letter followed by “++” indicates that the condition is yet another small step higher.  For example, a grade of Ex+++ means that the record is very close to being in the Mint range, but still just shy of it.

This may seem like a strange system at first glance but I use it because I feel that the standard grading systems are inadequate, as they simply don't allow for enough grades or degrees within those grades.  Many don't use Excellent, for example, which means that there is a jump from Mint down to Very Good—and there are a whole lot of grading possibilities in between those two, the way I see it.