Archive for the ‘General New Age’ Category

Steve Orchard is a New Age musician from the UK releasing the third album from his Dancer Trilogy Series. With this sequential album, a bold and thoughtful design in dancing rhythms, along with lively choreographed melodies entice ones imagination exactly like the first and second in series were envisioned.

Moondancer is the conclusive result in his highly imaginative Dancer Trilogy Series, reaching a point where it couldn’t get any better than what I have heard so far with the first two. Then again, it becomes clear Steve reaches for the stars on the rhythmic dancer series featuring earthly qualities of rain, sun and moon elements.

Steve Orchard from Bristol, England is quite masterful at producing electronic instrumental music composed with improvised mood sensations and a progressive repertoire of lively rhythms. If you have read our interview or earlier album reviews you know that Steve Orchard is a prolific singer songwriter having composed and performed original music for many years on guitar, mandolin, and harmonica, various skin drums, piano and keyboards. His music was featured on BBC Radio, film scores, local radio jingles, plus Steve was a band member in 100’s of concert venues and a recognized soloist in South West & London England during the 1990′s.

Drawing inspiration from the natural environment, Steve’s first in series Raindancer is based in a tropical soundscape where beautiful South American rhythms are explored with flutes, panpipes, acoustic guitars, keyboards percussion, and a wonderful array of elements by synthesizer.

Sundancer is an emblematic second album in Steve Orchard’s Trilogy Series, and like the first album, the second reflects rare qualities of relaxing yet energetic melodies that I felt achieve universal appeal. In fact the energetic symmetry, illuminating atmosphere and Island music impression did help propel Sundancer to the eighth award winning position in our NewAgeMusic.nu Best Albums Awards for 2010.

Moondancer is the twilight and glowing counterpoint keeping well in contrast to the first two albums, but I do want to point out that Moondancer is far from being a boring or lull you to sleep album. Here again you will find radiant melodic imagery right beside a natural and reposeful atmosphere, and this is where an emphasis on the dancer suffix comes into play.

Counting Stars begins the twilight sequence of the series with a light keyboard melody set in a deeper background and like Apollo’s Return, mysterious imagery is not the prevalent consequence with this first song, or the entire album as a whole. Moondancer is carried out with a deeper contrast in style as the moon prefix implies, yet is very complimentary to the first two albums sunnier atmosphere so you will find this album preserves many of the same rhythmic qualities which are an integral part of the entire dancer series.

The three songs Phases & Tides, Nebula and Grimaldis Comet help make the distinction clear since bongo drums and other percussion enhancements gently counterbalance deeper keyboard tones, infusing shades of light which in turn introduce a more illuminating atmosphere. The soft flute melody in moderately timed Nocturne creates an interesting contrast when combined with the twinkling effect by keyboard. Lost Contact has a deep futuristic feel by the dreamy keyboard and synthesizer tones while Earth Glue adheres to the counterbalance theme by a wood flute melody with percussion woodblock, but intermittent chanting does convey a strong tribal influence too.

NewAgeMusic.nu & NewAgeMusicWorld.com feature many outstanding musicians who are all are capable of producing mood elevating music to either help you relax and unwind, brighten your day or even inspire you by notes that seem to dance. The Dancer Trilogy Series from Steve Orchard is an all-inclusive colorful kaleidoscope of vibrant melodies, and this latest is no exception. It is lively music rhythms in step with a wonderful radiant design.

Visit steveorchardmusic.co.uk to sample / purchase the album or visit MG Music to sample / purchase and then read our interview and album reviews on our pages dedicated to Steve Orchard.

Moondancer cover design copyright David Orchard. Big Stock Photo – mpemberton.

Paul Winter Consort‘s new album Miho: Journey to the Mountain has the following tagline: A celebration of I. M. Pei’s Miho Museum and the Shigaraki Mountains in Japan. Given this I think it would be wise to let Paul Winter give a small presentation his relationship with this museum and what made him dedicate this album to it before commenting the actual music. The story is very interesting:

During the many times I have visited and performed in Japan since the Consort’s first tour in 1987, I dreamed of making an album inspired by the culture and natural beauty of Japan. On each visit I made a trip to a different natural site among the many islands of the archipelago: from Hokkaido in the north, where I saw the tanchos (red-crowned cranes) in Kushiro; to the blue-coral reefs of Ishigaki in the south; the giant Yaku Sugi trees on the island of Yakushima; and the forests of the southernmost island, Iriomote, home to the rare and fabled Iriomote wildcat. I could not have imagined that it would be a museum that enabled me to realize this dream.

Paul Winter

Paul Winter tells about how he in 2000 on a trip to Japan got to visit Miho Museum. It was a visit he would never forget. He writes:

The Miho is like no other museum on the planet. It is an extraordinary marriage of architecture and nature, totally integrated with the landscape. In every corner of it, every cell of the architecture, and every view from its windows out to the surrounding valleys and mountains, there is sublime beauty. I have never before fallen in love with a building. The antiquities of the museum’s collection come from ancient cultures throughout Asia and represent a kind of chronicle of the human journey of the past several thousand years.

Paul Winter

Miho: Journey to the Mountain contains a massie 22 tracks. Some of them are very short though, from 43 seconds to just about 2 minutes. Here we get to hear interesting instruments (like the bendir, the Heckelphone and many others) combined with the sounds of nature. The songs all have the trademark of Paul Winter Consort, which shifts from lonely sounding saxophones to the warmest, most passionate vocals. The album contains one song that hit me immediately ; Arto (Before It´s Too Late). Arto Tuncboyaciyan´s vocal and Jordan Rudess´ keyboard sound totally divine. And there is more, songs like Yangjin (Words Of Wish Fulfillment) and Remembering are carefully crafted masterworks.

Miho: Journey to the Mountain is simply an amazing album. It is interesting, melodic and very creative. It makes you want to visit this special Japanese museum. Paul Winter ends the cover notes with this comment:

No record album production in history has ever had more support than that we received from the staff of the Miho Museum and from the members of the Shumei community. On behalf of all my musical colleagues, I want to convey our great thanks to all of you.

Paul Winter

We here at .nu give our thanks too; you made this wonderful album possible!

Sample the album at Bandcamp. Also take a look at the homepage of the Miho Museum.

Picture Copyright Paul Winter

Before the release of Yanni’s new album Truth Of Touch on February 8th there is a free Listening Party going on at AOL Music.

So what are you waiting for – head over to AOL to stream the full album. And while listening, check out our world exclusive review of the album. NewAgeMusicWorld.com / NewAgeMusic.nu were the first to publish a review of this album.

Enjoy!

In the end of December the result of the Enigma Social song project, called MMX (The Social Song), was completed. Here Enigma fans showed their talent in singing, designing covers, and creating a song together, but one thing has so far been missing; the music video.

One of Enigma´s trademarks for 20 years has been the amazing music videos. And this is what Michael Cretu and the Enigma management now want help with: They encourage everyone to submit their music videos made for the “Social Song”.

The submission deadline will be February 11, 2010 at 4pm GMT+1. After closing date Michael will select his Top10 videos, which then you can select your favorite from. The winner of the overall voting will be announced on February 28, 2010. For more details on the procedure and requirements, click here.

Below are the two first videos that have been submitted. I must say I´m impressed with the quality so far.

I am certain the recent article by B.T. Fasmer informing you about The original Truth Of Touch release from Yanni has created some excitement for our visitors. It certainly has for us ! After going to the official Yanni truthoftouch.com website for pre – release samples, then reading the fan comments at his YouTube videos section and their excitement, I can say in all honesty the anticipation level is exceptionally high and this original composition from Yanni is creating quite a sensation.

It’s easy to see why people are excited since even the Truth Of Touch samples are magnificent !

You are invited to find out why this epic release from Yanni coming February 8, 2011 will be a must have release for a multitude of people worldwide. Voyage from Truth Of Touch is featured in the video below, plus everything you need to know is available at yanni.com with info and song samples from the album for your listening pleasure at truthoftouch.com.

Yanni tells us his thoughts about Truth Of Touch, then sample the related videos after the song below.

Your friends here at NewAgeMusic.nu and NewAgeMusicWorld.com wish you and your family a peaceful and joyous Christmas celebration!

We have recently reviewed a selection of fine new age music Christmas albums, which you can find here. On January 1 we will publish our annual best album award – so happy celebration, and remember to visit us when the new year is here.

Tangerine Dream has music for every occation – even Christmas. Or at least, they can rock and do other material from other artists to create the perfect holiday atmosphere. See the video here - brought us by the friendly folks at JibJab.

The result of the three month long Enigma Social Song Project is now ready. The song is a collaboration between Michael Cretu of Enigma and loyal fans online. The song is called MMX The Social Song.

In 3 steps users online participated in the creation of the song. They sent in original vocal tracks, decided on musical styles, created covers, voted and commented. Along the process mastermind Michael Cretu allowed people to look behind the curtain recording several video messages from his studio.

“The Social Song idea started as an experiment and it turned out to become a great and successful journey, which brought so many Enigma fans and music lovers together. There hasn’t been anything comparable in the music industry – namely being so social to the core. I really enjoyed this experience,” Cretu says according to EnigmaSocialSong.com.

“This was just the beginning…” Michael sums up, “there will be more collaboration projects coming in the near future.” Updates will be published on Enigma’s official website www.EnigmaSpace.com and on different social networks channels.

We here at .nu are amazed of the result. The song is catchy, fresh & modern sounding, and most importantly, very enigmatic. Excellent work, everybody! We must also thank Michael for doing this. It is truly a one-of-a-kind project, and a nice Christmas present to all his fans.

The song will be available as a digital download through major music outlets soon, but if you want it now you can get it by telling your friends about the project through Facebook and Twitter. Read more about this here.

Here you can listen to the final song.

MMX (The Social Song) by EnigmaSpace

And here are Michael’s final words:

The above cover artwork was created by Lars Doerwald.

The new year has lots in store for Yanni fans! On February 8th the first album of all new material composed by Yanni himself since 2003  will be released (last album was Ethnicity). The title is Truth Of Touch. The album will contain 13 songs, and a complete track listing can be found here. 

By clicking here you can sample the new album:

We are promised “The Return of Yanni As We Know Him” And WOW, what a feast this is turning out to become! These first clips shows truly that Yanni is back in shape, and ready to give us breathtakingly beautiful, larger-than-live music for those special moments.

And in connection with the release, a lot of products have been made available at the Yanni Store. Here you can buy t-shirts, umbrellas and posters.

Truth Of Touch will for sure be one of next year’s major titles, and we can – from what we have heard so far – say that it will be a worthy return from Yanni.

Enya’s album And Winter Came… has since its release in November 2008 been on the top of the new age music sales charts worldwide. It lost the first place for a short while when her Best of album was released last year, but quickly was back on top. It has even been on the top of national iTunes charts when the respective country has been in the middle of summer.

And Winter Came… has so far sold over 3 million copies. For Enya this actually not that much (given the fact that she has sold over 70 million records) – but in today’s market it is a lot. This December the album is also to be found on the very top of many national iTunes charts. As of writing it is on top in Spain, Netherlands, Portugal, Denmark, Finland and many other (see below). It is interestingly not to be found on the top 10 list in the US at the moment, where Christmas Carols by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir is on top. As you can see, it is not on top in Canada either – where Ultimate Spa Relaxation by Relaxing Music Ensemble.

So what makes And Winter Came… into such a hit? It would be too easy to say that it has to do with the strong Enya trademark. To me And Winter Came… is far from Enya’s best work, not even her best Christmas album (I like Sounds of the Season (2006) better). But And Winter Came… has a very consistent sound, with a nice mix of holiday favorites (like O Come o Come Emmanuel) and new material (like the playful One Toy Soldier). The album also contains Trains and Winter Rains, which is true Enya hit material.

And Winter Came… is all in all a fine album that appeals to almost everyone – which makes it into a perfect Christmas gift! If you want it as a MP3-album, Amazon has a special $ 5 sale now.