Alan Blyth and his friends at 'Gramophone' and 'Opera', the two most respected classical music magazines of the 20th century (surely), really gave us a lifelong treat with these three volumes (and their companion volumes, 'Song on Record' [1 and 2] and 'Choral Music on Record').

45 years on, naturally there are far too many omissions to make this book fully worthwhile. Yet that doesn't diminish the wonders of the 80 years of recording which Blyth and his team had access to, indeed it allows them often to go much further into the weeds, looking at recordings of individual arias, in a way that would be more difficult with all the additional recordings we have available today. Plus, the quality of the writing on each individual composer and opera is so high that the book is a pleasure to read regardless. ( )