André Rieu: La Vie Est Belle

Rating:
Summary: La Vie Est Belle indeed!
Review: A most beautiful program containing a marvelous selection of orchestral pieces, both classical and popular; reminds one of Boston Pops. The musicians are outstanding and produce a large, warm sound full of vigor and depth - and their costumes are marvelous too.

To say that Maestro Rieu is passionate about his music is an understatement. You can see, hear and feel his emotion over every piece. Pure love and respect, for the music and his audience. He is also charming and graceful on stage. He surely is a talented and inspiring conductor and musician. A rare breed indeed.

The production quality is first rate, visually and as a listening experience. Even Nature becomes part of the show with a sudden, unexpected lightening flash, as if to express Her approval.

La Vie Est Belle achieves what art is meant to do - enrich our lives. I have watched this video countless times and always leave the experience feeling joyful...and grateful, too. Bravo Maestro Rieu!

Rating:
Summary: La Vie Est Belle
Review: 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.

Rating:
Summary: Consistently Good Andre!
Review: 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.

Rating:
Summary: Consistently Good Andre!
Review: 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', 'Poliusko 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.

Rating:
Summary: What you get is splendid but too much is missing.
Review: 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.