..:: audio-music dot info ::..


Main Page      The Desert Island      Copyright Notice
 Aa Bb Cc Dd Ee Ff Gg Hh Ii Jj Kk Ll Mm Nn Oo Pp Qq Rr Ss Tt Uu Vv Ww Xx Yy Zz


Sarah Brightman: A Winter Symphony

 A l b u m   D e t a i l s


Label: Manhattan Records
Released: 2008.11.04
Time:
 43:50
Category: Classical
Producer(s): Frank Peterson
Rating: *****..... (5/10)
Media type: CD
Web address: www.sarahbrightman.com
Appears with:
Purchase date: 2013
Price in €: 1,00





 S o n g s ,   T r a c k s


[1] Arrival - 3:15
[2] Colder than Winter - 4:02
[3] Ave Maria (feat. Fernando Lima) - 4:08
[4] Silent Night - 3:08
[5] In the Bleak Midwinter - 3:43
[6] I've Been This Way Before - 3:50
[7] Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring - 3:58
[8] Child in a Manger - 3:08
[9] I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday - 4:48
[10] Amazing Grace - 3:04
[11] Ave Maria - 2:52
[12] I Believe in Father Christmas - 3:44

 A r t i s t s ,   P e r s o n n e l


Sarah Brightman - Choir/Chorus, Keyboard Programming, Keyboards, Programming, Vocals, Background Vocals

Carsten Heusmann - Adaptation, Arranger, Audio Engineer, Audio Production, Choir/Chorus, Engineer, Hammond B3, Keyboard Programming, Keyboards, Organ, Hammond Organ, Producer, Programming, Background Vocals
Peter Weihe - Guitar
Alex Grube - Bass, Bass Guitar
Trevor Barry - Bass
Curt Cress - Drums
Hein Gas - Drums
Ralph Salmins - Drums
Roland Peil - Percussion
Stephen Henderson - Percussion
Jan Eric Kohrs - Choir/Chorus, Piano, Background Vocals
Gunther Laudahn - Choir/Chorus, Pianoharp, Vocals, Background Vocals
Anna Coralee - Choir/Chorus, Background Vocals
Carolin Fortenbacher - Choir/Chorus, Background Vocals
Kallas - Choir/Chorus, Drums, Background Vocals
Billy King - Choir/Chorus, Background Vocals
Fernando Lima - Vocals on [3]

London Symphony Orchestra - Orchestra
Royal Philharmonic Orchestra - Orchestra
Steve Sidwell - Conductor, Orchestra, Orchestration
Pete Murray - Conductor, Orchestration, Piano
Capital Voices - Choir/Chorus
Crouch End Festival Chorus - Choir/Chorus
Paul Bateman - Conductor, Orchestration
Monteverdi Choir - Choir/Chorus,
Nemo Choir - Choir/Chorus

Frank Peterson - Adaptation, Arranger, Audio Engineer, Audio Production, Choir/Chorus, Engineer, Mixing, Producer, Background Vocals
Toni Pintos - Audio Engineer
Simon Rhodes - Audio Engineer, Engineer
Niall Acott - Audio Engineer, Engineer
Jorge Avendaño - Audio Engineer, Engineer
Charly Bauernfeind - Audio Engineer
Volker Heintzen - Audio Engineer, Engineer
Arcadio Hernández - Audio Engineer, Engineer
Stefan Glaumann - Mixing
Dennis Preiss - Editing, Engineer
Tom Meyer - Mastering
Simon Fowler - Photography
Jim Morey - Management
Dominic Aurich - Booking
Uwe Heckmann - Booking
Cheeky Berndt - Production Coordination
Kathrin Kiesewetter - Copyright Coordinator, Music Clearance, Sample Clearance
Jens Schippmann - Legal Advisor
David Click - Legal Advisor
Joseph Mohr - Text
Christina Rossetti - Text
Lachlan Macbean - Text Translation

 C o m m e n t s ,   N o t e s


A Winter Symphony is a Christmas album from the English soprano singer Sarah Brightman, released in November 2008. The album borrows it's name from Brightman's earlier 2008 album, Symphony. A deluxe edition was released through Barnes & Noble, which included extra tracks and a DVD that featured documentary segments: "The Making of A Winter Symphony", a photo gallery, and Brightman's live performances of "Fleurs du Mal", "Symphony", "Let It Rain", and "Running" from NBC's Fashion on Ice Show. Brightman chose a number of traditional songs from the season: "Silent Night", "In the Bleak Midwinter", and "Child in a Manger", as well as two versions of "Ave Maria", one being the classical piece by French composer Charles Gounod, and the other -in duet with tenor Fernando Lima- an original by Brightman and Mexican composer Jorge Avedaño. Included are also contemporary pop tunes, such as Vince Gill's "Colder Than Winter", a cover of Neil Diamond's "I've Been This Way Before" and Roy Wood's "I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday". The set continues with a rendition of "Amazing Grace" and closes with a reading of "I Believe in Father Christmas" originally by Emerson, Lake & Palmer. To promote the album, in the week of December 15 - 22, Brightman's "Silent Night" was the iTunes "Free Single of the Week" and the video for "I Believe in Father Christmas" was launched to accompany the single. Brightman also performed at the "Walt Disney World Christmas Day Parade" performing "Silent Night" on December 23, 2008 and it was broadcast by ABC on December 25, 2008. A Winter Symphony won for Best Classical Album of the Year at the 23rd Japan Gold Disc Awards. Selling about 14,000 copies in the first week in the United States, the album debuted at number thirty-eight on the Billboard Top 200. It also made another debuts such as the Top Classical Crossover Albums at number-three;[6] It scored a number six in the Top Holiday Albums, being the first entry for Brightman on this chart and debuted at number-four on the Top Internet Albums. In Japan, the album debuted in the top 15, peaking at No. 12 selling 13,953 copies in its first week of release.




You probably already know whether or not you're going to like this album, but for those who haven't yet encountered the phenomenon called Sarah Brightman, a stab at objective description may be in order. The genre is British crossover classical, with a mixture of contemporary pop-style tunes and more traditional numbers, in this case Christmas carols. Some of the factors that have made Brightman unusually successful among practitioners coming from the pop/Broadway side of the genre are on display in this seasonal release, with the outer covers showing Brightman slogging through a winter landscape and the booklet artwork showing the prone, bare-shouldered singer swathed in diaphanous linens and looking awestruck as snowflakes or confetti (better hope it's the latter) drop from above. First and foremost is Brightman's voice. You can argue over whether Andrea Bocelli or Russell Watson has operatic chops, but the debate is irrelevant in Brightman's case. She's the crossover equivalent of Donna Summer or Beyoncé, a singer who is good at adapting her voice to the needs of the surrounding production. Other examples might be the two female vocalists of ABBA, from whose Arrival LP the opening selection is drawn. But Brightman can do more with her voice than those Swedes, and part of what gives people chills is the way she can push her squeaky sound up into its top register in a piece like "Silent Night" (track 4) and not lose control. A second thing Brightman's albums do well (and here the credit goes to the producers and arrangers) is to make a symphony orchestra (several of Europe's finest, actually) sound uncannily like a pure product of studio electronics. Is that a good thing? Brightman detractors might read the Harry Crews novel Car, in which a redneck junkyard employee becomes distraught over the prevalence of mechanization and attempts to eat an entire car piece by piece, before saying no. The third effective piece of musical intelligence here is the selection of material. The subconscious cues that make music like this work are buried below the surface, and the surfaces work best if they are calmly simple. This does not foreclose gnomic lyrics like those of Andersson and Ulvaeus or of Neil Diamond (the little-known "I've Been This Way Before"); indeed, they can enhance the overall effect. Brightman and her producers have a knack for picking songs that aren't hackneyed, yet go down easily. Most of her colleagues would not have been likely to pick "Colder than Winter" by U.S. country singer/songwriter Vince Gill, for example, but it works like a charm. All in all, if you like Sarah Brightman, you are virtually guaranteed to like this album. And if you're absorbed by the strangeness that is European pop culture, you just might like it too.

James Manheim - AllMusic.com
 

 L y r i c s


Currently no Lyrics available!

 M P 3   S a m p l e s


Currently no Samples available!