Customer Reviews

Aznavour 2000

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Charles Aznavour, although over 70, keeps turning out extradordinary new material. Like his American contemporary Tony Bennett, he is not content to ride on the coat-tails of his legend, and continues to take on vocally challenging songs, passing the test with style. But unlike Bennett, Aznavour, also a pianist, composes his own material, including every song on this new CD, which features two numbers from his musical on the life of the painter Toulouse-Latrec. By turns sassy, humorous, deeply moving, or just plain sexy, there's something on here for every mood, with styles ranging from big-band jazz to Latin-tinged dance music to, of course, Aznavour's signature classic "chanson française".

Even if you don't understand the French lyrics, the marvellous orchestrations by Yvan Cassar (sometimes recalling the best of Quincy Jones or Nelson Riddle) and Aznavour's unique vocal personality are enough to get the feeling -- and the swing -- across.

My husband and I enjoy all kinds of music, whether it's Renaissance polyphony or the latest hits on MTV, and this was our favorite CD this year. Let's just hope that Aznavour doesn't keep his promise to make it his "dernière tournée"!

The legendary Charles Aznavour was in his mid 70's when he recorded this, and he sounds fabulous. The throaty voice, full of powerful emotion, singing his 14 new marvelous songs is a delectable treat for the ears, and the soul.

Many of the tracks have an upbeat jazzy sound, but it's the lyrical ones that are my very favorites..."Qu' avons nous fait de nos vingt ans", with its echoes of his Armenian roots weaving through the verses..."Dans tes bras", with its background of Ravel's Bolero..."Quand tu m'aimes" and "Je ne savais pas" are from his comedie musical "Lautrec", the later with a nifty samba rhythm.

Aznavour won Time.com's on line poll as "Entertainer of the Century" and I believe that was well deserved...with 18% he edged out Elvis ! A prolific songwriter (over 600 songs), an actor, a singer, and a dynamite performer, he's Frances national treasure, and his genius God's gift to the world.

I didn't hear about Aznavour until I saw the movie "The Truth About Charlie". And it was a revelation when I heard him sing Quand Tu M'aimes. It was just perfect and I just have to find out about him. Although I know very little french, I knew the song was romantic. Now, I play the song in my head over and over again... :)

I heard about Charles Aznavour through the movie "The Truth About Charlie," which really wasn't a very good movie, but the music was phenominal. I looked at this CD on Amazon, and finally purchased it. I couldn't believe the amazing sound! "Le jazz est revenu" was amazing. The orchestrations by Yvan Cassar were just phenominal. From a musicians standpoint, there was a lot of variance in his music. It wasn't all loud, and all soft. There were many dynamics and the CD is in a word, perfect. However, I only gave the CD four stars because there are a coupld of tracks at the begining that, I'm sorry to say, have a Ricky Martin sound. (These are some of Ricky's slow songs). I didn't think the sound was appropriate for a man of this amazing sound. I just had to get over the Ricky sound at the beginning.

PLEASE DO NOT LET THAT DISCOURAGE YOU!!! THIS IS AN NCREDIBLE CD, AND WOULD BE A WONDERFUL ADDITION TO EVERYONE'S COLLECTION.

I love his voice, and even though I don't speak a word of French, the music is absolutely beautiful. I might have to buy it again as it was stolen from my car with the rest of my CDs.

This is a wonderful CD. Listening to it is very easing and if you want to understand what is said you can google for the words and even have them translated to english. It's more meaningful when you can understand what his message is.