I can't really recall why I bought this pair of warhorses from Amazon . . . it seemed a good idea at the time, perhaps? As a budding classical music fan in the early 1960s, I remember listening to the Tchaikovsky 1812 with reverence and awe; the Beethoven piece I found much later, paired with the Tchaikovsky chesnut on a Philadelphia Orchestra LP. Both are dramatic, a workout for your stereo, but there's nothing new here, in either recording. But anyone who buys this disc surely does not want or expect anything new . . . no doubt my yawn is occasioned by the simple fact that I've heard this music far too many times to find anything exciting in it now that I'm no longer that adolescent boy discovering classical standards. I wish I could recapture the thrill of such new discoveries, but alas, it rarely happens now that I'm 61. These are competent recordings, but to me it is just "same old, same old."