Trans-Siberian Orchestra
Trans-Siberian Orchestra is an American neoclassical metal band founded in 1996 by producer, composer, and lyricist Paul O'Neill, who brought together Jon Oliva and Al Pitrelli and keyboardist and co-producer Robert Kinkel to form the core of the creative team. The band gained in popularity when they began touring in 1999 after completing their second album, The Christmas Attic, the year previous. In 2007, The Washington Post referred to them as "an arena-rock juggernaut" and described their music as "Pink Floyd meets Yes and the Who at Radio City Music Hall". TSO has sold more than ten million concert tickets and over ten million albums. The band has released a series of rock operas: Christmas Eve and Other Stories, The Christmas Attic, Beethoven's Last Night, The Lost Christmas Eve, their two-disc Night Castle and Letters from the Labyrinth. Trans-Siberian Orchestra is also known for their extensive charity work and elaborate concerts, which include a string section, a light show, lasers, moving trusses, video screens, and effects synchronized to music.
Both Billboard Magazine and Pollstar have ranked them as one of the top twenty-five ticket-selling bands in the first decade of the new millennium. Their path to success was unusual in that, according to O'Neill, TSO is the first major rock band to go straight to theaters and arenas, having never played at a club, never having been an opening act and never having had an opening act.
History
Origins and formation
managed and produced rock bands including Aerosmith, Humble Pie, AC/DC, Joan Jett, and Scorpions, later producing and co-writing albums by the progressive metal band Savatage, where he began working with Robert Kinkel, Al Pitrelli and Jon Oliva. Oliva had left Savatage to spend time with his family and take care of personal matters. O'Neill took his first steps into rock music in the 1970s when he started the progressive rock band Slowburn, for whom he was the lyricist and co-composer. What was intended to be the band's debut album was recorded at Jimi Hendrix's Electric Lady Studios and engineered by Dave Wittman. Although Wittman's engineering was capturing the exact sound O'Neill was hearing in his head, O'Neill was having trouble with it because many of his melodies were between two and three octaves. Rather than releasing an album that he was not happy with, he shelved the project, but continued working in the industry at Contemporary Communications Corporation.Over the years, O'Neill continued to work as a writer, producer, manager, and concert promoter. In 1996, he accepted Atlantic Records' offer to start his own band. He built the band on a foundation created by the marriage of classical and rock music and the artists he idolized, such as Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Queen, Yes, The Who, and Pink Floyd, and hard rock bands such as Aerosmith and Led Zeppelin and the multiple lead vocalists of the R&B groups the Temptations and the Four Tops. He brought in Oliva, Kinkel, and Pitrelli to help start the project. O'Neill has stated, "My original concept was six rock operas, a trilogy about Christmas and maybe one or two regular albums."
Trans-Siberian Orchestra has sold over 10 million albums in the United States, making it one of the most commercially successful touring acts combining rock and classical music.
In the 1980s I was fortunate enough to have visited Russia. If anyone has ever seen Siberia, it is incredibly beautiful but incredibly harsh and unforgiving as well. The one thing that everyone who lives there has in common that runs across it in relative safety is the Trans-Siberian Railway. Life, too, can be incredibly beautiful but also incredibly harsh and unforgiving, and the one thing that we all have in common that runs across it in relative safety is music. It was a little bit overly philosophical, but it sounded different, and I like the initials, TSO.
''Christmas Eve and Other Stories'' and ''The Christmas Attic'' (1996–1998, 2014)
Their debut album, the first installment of the intended Christmas Trilogy, was a rock opera called Christmas Eve and Other Stories, and was released in 1996. It remains among their best-selling albums. It contains the instrumental "Christmas Eve/Sarajevo 12/24" which originally appeared on Savatage's rock opera, Dead Winter Dead, a story about the Bosnian War. Their 1998 release The Christmas Attic, the sequel to Christmas Eve and Other Stories followed a similar format. This album produced the hit "Christmas Canon", a take on Johann Pachelbel's Canon in D major with lyrics and new melodies added.The Christmas Attic was first performed live in 2014.
''Beethoven's Last Night'' (1999–2000, 2010–2012)
Beethoven's Last Night was written and recorded in 1998 and 1999 and turned over to Atlantic Records in late 1999 for release in 2000. The story begins when Mephistopheles appears before Beethoven, whom Paul O'Neill refers to as "the world's first Heavy Metal Rock Star", to collect the great composer's soul. Of course Beethoven is horrified at the thought of eternal damnation, but the devil has an offer and the bargaining begins. There are numerous plot twists including the fate of his music, and the ending is based on a true but little known fact about Beethoven. Also in 1998, at the request of Scott Shannon of WPLJ, they performed live for the first time in a charity concert for Blythedale Children's Hospital. In 1999, at the urging of Bill Louis, a DJ for WNCX in Cleveland, they did their first tour, during which they debuted sections of Beethoven's Last Night. They performed the album in its entirety for the first time during the spring tour of 2010. In October 2011, Beethoven's Last Night was released in Europe to coincide with their European tour with new cover art by Greg Hildebrandt and the missing pages of poetry from the original release.The Mephistopheles songs are sung by Jon Oliva.
To coincide with the 2012 spring tour, Beethoven's Last Night: The Complete Narrated Version was released by Atlantic/Rhino/Warner Brothers Record. This two-disc deluxe edition includes all the music from the original release and, for the first time, the narration featured during live performances of the album. It comes packaged with a booklet filled with Hildebrandt's illustrations of the story, plus the full lyrics and narration. The narration is performed by Bryan Hicks, who has been handling the live narration on the tours for this album. Creator Paul O'Neill explains, "This is how I have always envisioned the story being experienced. Where the listener can relax, close their eyes and within minutes be wandering the streets of 1800s Vienna with Beethoven on the last great adventure of his life."
''The Lost Christmas Eve'' (2004, 2013, 2024)
Whenever the band was off the road they returned to the studio and in 2004 completed The Lost Christmas Eve, the final installment of the Christmas Trilogy. It is a story of loss and redemption that encompasses a rundown hotel, an old toy store, a blues bar, a Gothic cathedral and their respective inhabitants all intertwined on a single enchanted Christmas Eve in New York City. The next year they combined all three Christmas albums and released them in a box set titled The Christmas Trilogy, which also contained a DVD of their 1999 TV special The Ghosts of Christmas Eve ''The Lost Christmas Eve'' was first performed live in 2012 followed by a encore tour in 2013. Critics once again called it "stunning showmanship" "that included every trick known to man kind including massive pyro, spectacular lasers, stages that hover over the audience, hot back up singers all the while constantly connecting with their audience."''Night Castle'' (2009–2011)
After another few years of touring, Night Castle, Trans-Siberian Orchestra's fifth album, released on October 27, 2009 was well received by fans and critics alike. It debuted at #5 on the Billboard Album Charts. It was certified gold in eight weeks and later platinum. "Their most ambitious and adventurous work to date. It runs the gamut from hard rock to classical taking the listener on a journey through history detailing the triumphs and follies of man but is ultimately a story of transformation and love." Initially intended to be their first regular, non rock opera, consisting of ten stand alone songs album, O'Neill credits Jon Oliva persistence that it was too early for such a move and that the fifth album had to be a rock opera. Insisting that "TSO was not like any other band and that the fans expected a story. It was a little bit of a role reversal because when we were working in Savatage, I was always wanting to do a concept record." The two-disc set includes a version of "O Fortuna" from Carmina Burana by Carl Orff, which was previewed live by the band during their 2004-2008 tours. An MP3 version of the album released through Amazon.com contains an additional track entitled "The Flight of Cassandra".The first half is a rock opera about a seven-year-old child on a beach who meets a stranger from New York City who tells her a story that takes her all around the world and through time where she encounters various characters, many of which are based on historical individuals such as Desiderius Erasmus. The second half pays homage to Trans-Siberian Orchestra's influences. It also contains new versions of several Savatage songs as well as "Nut Rocker", originally by B. Bumble and the Stingers and previously made famous by Emerson, Lake & Palmer, featuring Greg Lake on bass guitar.
In February 2011, Night Castle was released in Europe with two live bonus tracks added. Both live tracks were recorded on the 2010 spring tour at the Verizon Theatre at Grand Prairie, in Texas. Metal Kaoz, reviewed it as a two-hour plus double rock opera CD with, "no filler" that flows smoothly. "The classical layers meet the beauty of Metal music and form the fine blend... a wide range of emotions and musical colors...tracks that will blow your mind. Hit play and wander freely in TSO's, Night Castle."