Undercover blues: just how hard are retailers working to sell opera recordings? To find out, Joanne Sydney Lessner went incognito to several of Manhattan's largest record stores.

My generation hit college just as the CD emerged, which set in motion a transfer of our purchasing practices from the local vendor to the newly ascendant chain stores to the internet. As comfortable as we've grown with cyberspace, brick-and-mortar shopping still offers one distinct advantage: customer service. With all that has been written about the decline of the industry from the label perspective, it's time for a report from the field on the experience of the stalwart consumer sifting through the dwindling product.

All the stores I shopped at are in Manahattan, where I live. Because I was interested in how the selling of classical music was surviving within ...