Elton John Album: “Dream Ticket”

Elton John's release of Dream Ticket is truly an Elton John Fan's Dream. Even though I already own Elton John's "Greatest Hits -One Night Only" (Live at Madison Square Garden)DVD, "Dream Ticket" allows me to have a back-up copy of a great concert should I need to replace my very worn original.

I honestly believed that the London Royal Opera House DVD would turn out to be my favorite disc of the set (I have surround sound and couldn't wait to hear the Royal Academy orchestra backing Elton's arrangements). The orchestral arrangements along with Elton John's piano are truly magical. I thought that this was the ultimate - until - I heard his performance in Turkey.

Now,I have to say that my favorite disc is Elton's performance at the "Ephesus Amphitheatre" in Turkey. Here, you are invited to experience a very personal trip with Elton and his piano. The setting in the Ephesus Amphitheatre is very intimate and almost "other worldly". What you will see and hear is Elton at his best having a "love affair" with his piano. Here, you will see a man performing, who's music clearly comes from his soul. I would challange anyone to listen to "Rocket Man" on this disc and not come away with goose-bumps.

Even though a lot of songs are duplicated on the 3 discs (Madison Square, London and Turkey)the musical arrangements are all different. You will experience 3 very different concerts, with each performance working its own special brand of magic.

So sit back, have a glass of wine, turn the volume up and be present in the front row for one of the greatest performers and musicians of our time!!!! See which concert will turn out to be your favorite.

Enjoy!!!!!!!!!!!!

Don't quite understand why they included the Madison Square Garden concert, which is fairly recent and still selling as a single concert (I already own it). The 4th DVD is nice, but mostly music videos. It was hyped as something more archival and it would have been nice to have seen more classic footage of Elton performing through the years instead of music videos. I would have welcomed more performances of youthful Elton, in his prime, rockin' and poundin' those ivories! (And I did enjoy viewing the evolution of Elton's stage costumes over the years.)

Having said that, the Ephesus concert is worth the price of admission all by itself. My husband, who likes some of the music but is NOT an EJ fan by any stretch of the imagination, ended up viewing almost the entire Ephesus concert with me, as astounded as I was by the visual embodiment of Elton's mastery of the keyboard. He is an absolutely awesome pianist -- something for which you don't really get an appreciation because he's usually backed by his band. But this is just Elton, his voice and his piano and, boy, does he make that piano rock! My favourite Ephesus performance is "Honky Cat".

All in all, I'm definitely glad that I own this set.

Elton John is one of my all time favorite artists, and I jump whenever he releases something new. He is an amazing live performer (I know, I've seen him), and when I hear about the four disc dvd boxed set "Dream Ticket", which had three Elton concerts and a documentary, I knew it had to be in my collection.

This is a great collection of live shows and a documentary. The first dvd is the live televised concert from 2000, "One Night Only: Greatest Hits Live", which had been available separately for quite a while, so, despite being an incredible show, its inclusion is questionable.

The second disc is from Elton's show at The Royal Opera House, which is a truly special show, as Elton performs with a live orchestra for the first time since his legendary concerts in Australia back in 1986. This is an amazing show, and Elton, the band and the orchestar (London's Royal Academy of Music Orchestra and Choir) are on fire. They run through an energetic set of some of Elton's biggest hits, and throw in a few surprises ("Sixty Years On", "Burn Down The Mission").

The show at Ephesus, the Greek amphitheatre, is the best show of them all. Elton generally does his best shows when he's alone, without a band or any supporting muscians, and this show is no exception. Elton has rarely been better than at this show. Alone, with no one else except a lively audience, he performs nearly 30 songs (who else can honestly go through that many songs in one show?), including "Honky Cat", "Mona Lisas And Mad Hatters", "Rocket Man", "Your Song" and many other classics.

"Elton In Four Decades" is a 90 minute documentatry of Elton detailing twelve of Elton's songs from the 1970s', 1980s', 1990s' and 2000s', from "Your Song" to "Are You Ready For Love". This is a fun documentary and a nice trip through time.

This is an excellent dvd that I recommend to all fans of Elton's music.

The collection is worth it for 2 reasons: 1 is the Royal Opera House with orchestra and the second is for the Ephesus show solo..they both look and sound great.

Elton Across Four Decades has Elton talking about the songs and showing footage from live and videos over the years. Two Rooms released in the early 90s goes into detail about their writing, as does Classic Albums: Goodbye Yellow Brick Road.

One Night Only is going into repackage overkill, the second package with the 1970-2002 Hits cover came off as misleading... it's a good show, but I know I'm not the only one who wondered what the point was in including this.

I would have loved to have seen Elton put out all the promo videos from 1970 to 2002 (or up to Peachtree Road) and "Tantrums and Tiaras", which has yet to be released in the US but has been on cable, capturing a side of Elton rarely seen but talked about.

Hopefully a lot of the older videos like Australia, Central Park, the BBC footage and Russia will make its way to DVD as well...

those dvds are very well done sound is good and clear image also for any fans of elton john this is the collection to get.

the show in turquey is one of the best performance of elton solo that i`ve seen so far

DENIS FILION