The vocal group seems to be a favored medium for European crossover marketers, perhaps because it allows the process of audience focus on individual members to work its magic -- fans can pick their favorite Divo just like their favorite Beatle. The good-looking young Italian tenors of
Andiamo are certainly capable of inspiring focus, not to mention cathexis, but established crossover acts still have little to fear -- music is still part of the equation, and the music included here doesn't make much of a connection. This is a set of Neapolitan songs, jazzed up with a few more contemporary tunes like "Volare" and a "Mona Lisa" that totally lacks the intimacy of Nat King Cole's version. Many of the arrangements have the three tenors standing together and belting out the tunes to the live audience present at a theater in Maastricht, in the Netherlands. This completely overwhelms the heartfelt sentiment of these songs, which depends on a concept of individual passion channeled into regular patterns, but one understands the decisions of the arrangers when one hears the unspectacular voices of the individual singers. Throw in bad live sound (sample track 12, in which one of the singers seems to be standing offstage), and you have another reason to avoid this effort to separate European crossover concertgoers (and U.S. PBS fundraiser viewers) from their hard-earned Euros or dollars.