André Rieu Possibly Doing Ten Concerts on The Vrijthof

Possibly TEN Concerts on The Vrijthof in 2011

MAASTRICHT - André Rieu will not conduct any Christmas concerts in the MECC in December. Rieu is thinking about expanding the number of his summer concerts on the Vrijthof from eight to ten. At the end of July, the MECC had announced that together with the conductor they were working on a program for the month of December. Rieu's spokesperson Kerstin Cornelis now says that report by the MECC was 'premature'.

According to Cornelis, there will definitely be no Rieu Christmas concerts in the MECC this year. The rumors about a series of concerts by the Maastricht Orchestra leader this winter were fueled by the copying of the Vrijthof in the MECC. That decor was built only as an alternative and possible backup to the summer concert series of Rieu's 'real' Vrijthof, in case of inclement weather. Actually the convention center was only used once when Rieu moved his concert from the evening to the afternoon on the day of the World Cup final. Due to the extreme summer heat the concert was moved to the MECC.

According to Cornelis the copied Vrijthof' and any eventual concerts during the winter are entirely independent from each other." "That was purely meant as an alternative to the Vrijthof concert during the summer. " Rieu is satisfied with the MECC as an alternate. Because of the success of that trial and the successful ticket sales of his forthcoming series of summer concerts in Maastricht, Rieu is contemplating expanding his series of summer concerts on the Vrijthof by two more concerts. That would increase the violinist's performances from eight to ten.

Apart from that, the violinist had to cancel his approaching Britain and Australia tours due to illness. Rieu has been suffering from a viral infection on his vestibular system for a while.

Written by Stefan Gybels and Transalted for us by John
Photo by Richard Oswick