Search - Maurice André :: At the Opera

Great album

12/13/2003

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Andre sounds great...musical, appropriate, contextual, great intonation...really superb job. Frank Palvolgyi...if you're good enough to chew out Andre...how come I don't see any of your recordings on the shelf? Maybe you should get your ass in a practice room..."

Perfect

Jason Pellett | Atlanta | 08/07/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This album changed my life. My whole approach to playing trumpet and phrasing changed by listening to it every day for months. When I listen to something else it is always a relief to hear this again. Those first string notes in the Bizet (I know it's track 5, but I always listen to it first) followed by that sound is like a religious experience. I figured out how to play high by listening to "Die Zauberflote: Der Holle Rache kocht in meinem Herzen". The whole album is a study in perfect phrasing, though I think "Traviata" and "Norma" are especially sublime. And I don't even have words to describe the opening of "Lakme".

"

The greatest trumpet player in the world.

Steve Frazier | Seattle | 08/04/2000

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I have a hard time giving Maurice Andre stars because stars were meant for mortals and if you know anything about him you know he's definitely not of this world. I also imagine that even Maurice Andre playing the telephone book would probably be worth 10 stars.In any case, here is Maurice playing transcriptions of Opera arias. If you are a true, rabid opera fan, this will probably strike you as some kind of sacrilege, and you will weep with rage. Get over it, and go buy your 47th copy of some singer hacking her way through Carmen. If you like hearing a great trumpet player exploring the lyrical possibilities of his instrument, then you are in the right place. It's especially appropriate for any of you trumpet players out there who spent your formative years playing the opera arias & song transcriptions in the back of the infamous J. Arban's Method for Trumpet Players. If that's how you spent your youth (like me), instead of having a normal social life, you owe it to yourself to buy this CD. Maurice does it right."