Customer Reviews

Andre Rieu - La Vie Est Belle

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Our family has most of Andre Rieu's DVDs, and this one ranks near the top (We think his Dublin DVD is probably the best), in quality, musical selections, and repeated watchability. The 4 musical highlights on this DVD are 'Juliska from Budapest', 'Poliushko Polie' (my personal favorite), 'Bolero', and the title track, 'Life is Beautiful'. The selections include some bagpipers (2 tracks), a russian trio (3 tracks), Andre's female choir (mainly throughout), and a little bit of pyrotechnics (Bolero)...reflecting the variety Andre instills in his shows. I can understand some reviewers being upset by the length (shorter than the full actual concert), but I would take this as a sort of compliment to Andre...he leaves you wanting more! The DVD is great to watch or, turn your monitor off and just listen...If not this DVD, I think every family should invite some classical (Strauss, waltz) music into their house. Andre brings it to you in grand style, so I don't think you will be disappointed.

Recorded at Waldbühne Berlin, this video is very highly rated for musicianship and choice of beautiful music, but videographer Karl Müller ought to spend the rest of his days in isolated rehab. There is very little time spent on any particular frame of video. It is more like the editor is on a heavy trip with speed, given the nearly constant pan, zoom, fade in and out, jump frentically from scene to scene, and attempts to cover every member of this brilliant orchastra and chorus, and most members of the audience, on every piece of beautiful music. Such shabby editing detracts from an otherwise terrific album; listen to it closely, but don't waste any time looking at it. Something else missing, besides mature editing, is the participation by the always gorgeous and talented sopranos Carmen Monarcha and Carla Maffioletti, either or both of whom would certainly make the title worthy of being called Life is Beautiful. They are not featured at all.

Bought this recently. Thought I was buying full concert but it contains only selections from concert. It's only 59 minutes long and the selection of music is awful. CD version has a much better selection of music.

As with every performance Andre does a great job,And he takes you on a pleasant musical journey..Ive collected many of his DVDs Especially his european concerts,And Will see him in concert here in the states..Looking forward to that night...

The producto never come. I don't have it and the say nothing about it. I request for a explanation.

Great DVD on all accounts except they cut out a whole section of the concert. There was a Big Band segment of about 8 min. that they cut out with no need. Otherwise color and sound were excellent and the stageing.

This is one of my latest and favorite of Andre Rieu, and his wonderful orchestra. Delightful, warm, great.

Marvellous music amd showmanship, once again. The appeal is multigenerational --
We have fans in our family ranging from age 23 to 86.

If you like to wathc a great musicians it's the opportunity. Andre Rieu, at this time, is one of the best band leader.

This concert is in Berlin and Andre Rieu speaks in German which then is shown in English sub-titles. This annoying because the viewer does not catch the humor of Rieu's remarks which often depends on the pitch of his voice.

The concert is great but typically of Rieu the viewer only gets part of the concert and for this reason I did not rate the DVD as highly as I might have other wise. If the viewer wants to see how the rest of the concert went, the viewer will have to purchase "Dreaming", which I do not recommend because it is an incredibly boring DVD. But that DVD contains segments of the remainder of the Berlin concert. Viewers of "La vie est belle" will note that Rieu tells the audience that it looks like rain. However, why Rieu made that remark is never apparent. It is in "Dreaming" where segments of the latter part of the concert are shown and it is pouring rain and even the members of the orchestra have to put on coats. What the viewer also sees is that all the good music was played in this DVD where in "Dreaming" the music that was played later was not only boring, poorly arranged, and poorly played so maybe it is a good thing that the remainder of the concert was omitted in the DVD.

Nevertheless, it one of my favorites.