Star string trio replaces violinist
mainThe classical crossover group Times for Three has announced that Zach DePue, who co-founded the group 15 years ago, is leaving to spend more time at his day job as concertmaster of the Indianapolis Symphony Orch.
Zach is to be replaced by a Canadian violinist, Nikki Chooi.
The remaining players are violinist Nicolas Kendall and double bassist Ranaan Meyer. The group is signed to Universal Classics.
So, THIS crossover is “organic, grass fed” and its fine to eat, but Bocelli/Rieu/etc…is not?
Where is the breakdown? If you are a small act is fine, but once you start being really successful all of a sudden it pisses you off?
Explain
“Where is the breakdown?”
Have you heard them live?
If you have, you know the answer.
If you haven’t, then do hear them live, and judge for yourself.
It’s really simple. They are less creepy, play and write excellent music and by God those two can really nail the violin. To a much higher standard than Rieu, not just in terms of technique but also musical expression. They are just different quality musicians but not everyone wants to concede that some of us are really genuinely only judging from an objective standpoint from what we hear, rather than being duped by negative (or positive) media reinforcement. It also comes down to taste I guess. I begrudge Rieu nothing in terms of success and money though to me it wreaks of shmaltz and I really find his shows dull and so emotionally manipulative it scares me a little that people fall for it!! Time for Three are just cross-over writers and performers having a great time enjoying their music and enjoying whatever success comes out of that rather than over-formulating what they do based on what they know will make a load of dough. (Though I’m not suggesting there is no element of that in what they do at all, just a smaller percentage than Rieu.) Rieu meanwhile seems to me 90% businessman, 10% musician and I’m sorry but it tells in the way he plays.