André Rieu on Oprah

September 14, 2006 at 11:17 AM

I got a letter from Sonja Harper. A Dutch woman and big André Rieu fan, who lives in Cincenatti. She had made alot of transcriptions of interviews of André Rieu in English. Here is her website : www.andrerieutranslations.com
Although a lot of readers dislike Rieu [in Holland some people call him André Riool (sewer in English) or André Reu (male dog)], because is only plays light classical Strauss stuff and is very commercial, I am also a big fan because he introduce the violin for a much broader public than the high educated serious heavy classical people. I have been 3 times to his shows (show, not performance). Sometimes they talk about "world famous violinists" like Oistrach, Bell, Mutter, etc, but Rieu is really a "world famous violinist" , because a friend of mine found a Rieu-cd in a market in a a village in Ecuador. Nobody there had heard of Oistrach, although Oistrach is a much better violinist. Rieu addmitted in a Playboyinterview, as you can read on www.andrerieutranslations.com of Sonja Harper that there are much better violinists than he.
Sonja Harper also had tried to get Rieu in Oprah, as you can read here: http://www.andrerieutranslations.com/Sonjas-page/Oprahbox.html . But she even did nor reach the Oprah Magazine.