Starting a Classical Vinyl Music Collection

OP,

If you got virtually no improvement with the electrostatic cleaning. Then those disks were trashed. But this does not mean you should give up on used.

I recommend going to a used record store. Each time you find an interesting disk. Carefully pull it out of the sleeve (you know how to handle disks? Right?) and carefully examine it. When the light hits at the right angle you will be able to tell if the grooves are shiny and clean or dull. Buy a couple of the best you find. They are likely to sound great. With a little practice you can pick out only perfect disks. The cleaning can remove surface dust and debris, but not embedded or worn grooves. You will learn to separate the two.

I started back up from scratch almost five years ago. The first album I bought was Led Zeppelin II, then I bought Miles Davis Kind of Blue. I'm up to about 145 albums now, all of them VG+ or better and killer pressings. I've upgraded the Zep II to a RL and the KOB to a first press mono.

Pulling an album out of the discography, looking at it, placing it on the table, etc is a huge part of the whole experience for me. 

Don't forget to buy an ultrasonic record cleaning machine, it's a must have.

@jjbeason14 My suggestion is to play a LP or two and then send them in for a cleaning treatment from a service using a reputable method.

Of the outcome is as wanted and cleaning is the way forward, have a look at the Neil Antin PAVCR Tutorial, which offers a exceptional method for Manual Cleaning and the one I now use over all other methods previously available.

I now refer to LP's undergoing this method as Purified. 

If the manual method does become the method, have the few album previously cleaned done this way as well and see if any other cleanliness is seemingly produced.    

while vinyl has unquestionably resurged, the factors that led to its decline are still present. A poor quality lp that was issued half a century ago doesn’t improve with use and ageing.

What has changed is analog equipment quality . One needs to be above entry level, but today’s gear can track and extract much better than the gear that most of us had in our youth. However the complete eradication of surface noise, especially on vintage lps, is an unrealistic goal

First and foremost, you must sample a wide variety of music regardless of the medium you wish to use, and it is helpful to have some guidance because the field is so wide open and varied. 

You can get good guide books on collecting.  One of my favorites is "1,001 Classical Records You Must Hear Before You Die."  Not only does this book list very good recordings of specific pieces, it is organized chronologically by yea of composition so you can sample music from different eras to get an idea of what you like and what you need to hear more of to understand.  Another good guide, though quite long out of print are the various Penguin Guides to Classical Music.  There are many on-line listings that are useful too.  Particularly if you are interested in modern, late 20th century and 21st century music, Google The Guardian lists and articles on the subject.

It is impossible to make specific recommendations because each individual's tastes and interests vary so widely.  A friend in my office wanted an introduction to classical music so I lent him a selection from Renaissance to 20th century music.  His favorite was something unusual: Harry Partch's "Delusion of the Fury." 

If you become serious about classical music you MUST have access to digital medium because there is so much more available that way than on vinyl.  New music and new recordings of old music died a long time ago on vinyl.  Some of the reissues on digital medium sound better than the original vinyl issue, such as, most DG recordings from the 1970's (they had great artists under contract but put out bright and thin recordings that were improved upon when reissued on CD).