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Trans-Siberian Orchestra offers music filled with energy, emotion, inspiration, encouragement, and hope.
TSO fans have found this combination to be very addictive.
It's a wonderful thing...
"Formed by Paul O'Neill, Trans-Siberian Orchestra has formed a perfect fusion of music styles, from heavy metal to broadway to classical. Fixated on the beauty of Christmas, "Christmas Eve and Other Stories" and "The Christmas Attic" are two of their masterpieces. "Beethoven's Last Night" was the most recent to make its debut, living up to the band's insurmountable standards. For the first time ever, every generation can truly agree on what is certainly great music."---Yahoo/TSO Discussion Group |
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A Beautiful, Powerful Project is Born...
"We needed a name for the project, and I had visited Siberia and noticed how the landscapes there were so harsh and yet beautiful. The Trans-Siberian Railway, which runs through there, is the longest railway in the world, connecting the most people on earth, and I thought about how music is the universal language that connects the most people, and then we added the `Orchestra' part because of the symphonic-rock sound. We liked the 'TSO' initials as well, so the name stuck.'' ---Paul O'Neill on naming the group
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Bob Kinkel & Paul O'Neill --- Our Heroes!
Heavy Metal Optimism Is Alive!
"...the power of the arts is staggering. I believe that a lot of the great moves ahead for mankind have often come from the arts...The aim of arts is to touch the emotions, and the easiest emotion to trigger is anger. I mean, anyone can do it, you just walk out into the street and throw a rock at someone's head and they get angry. But to trigger laughter, sympathy, compassion, happiness, joy, those are much harder to do. If you can trigger those emotions, you can really create stories with a lot of depth..." --- Paul O'Neill
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Chris Caffery & Mark Wood - Baltimore 2001
photo by Mary Glenn
"...We break all the rules. Every album is a rock opera. It has a story and poetry between songs. When we started it, we knew we were going to break all the rules. We'll do anything to take people on a musical roller-coaster ride. We'll go from full symphony to piano ballad to a blues number to a slamming hard rock band to a single violin...When you mix it up like that, the rock band kicks that much harder, the symphony is more grandiose, the violin is more haunting and beautiful..."
--- Paul O'Neill
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Chris Caffery - Baltimore 2001
photo by Mary Glenn
"[TSO] is it's own little world...it's a little bit dirtier than broadway, and definitley alot classier than some rock shows, but in the end, it's alot of fun!
--- Chris Caffery
Hey! Somebody Got Some John Tesh in My Metallica!
--- Phoenix New Times
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Tommy Farese & Al Pitrelli - Omaha 2001
photo by Newbs
"...I come from the world of epic rock 'n' roll where it's, 'Give me a big stage show with as many lights as I can stick on the ceiling, and let me blow people away.' And we definitely want to take people for a roller coaster ride.."
--- Paul O'Neill
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Angus Clark & Malcolm Gold - Omaha 2001
photo by Newbs
"The orchestra produces a kind of classical gas fed by a steady diet of cheesy metal. It's the only Christmas music that goes well with cans of beer. These are not your parents' carolers; these are the carolers your mother warned you about..."
--- Jarrod Zickefoose-ClevelandScene.com |
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Chris and Dave - Baltimore 2001
photo by Mary Glenn
``We didn't know what to expect [the first 7 show Christmas tour in 1999]...Our first show in Cleveland sold out in an hour and a half, and we put two more on sale there. I realized something then-- That people want to see this music played live.''
---Bob Kinkel |
Al Pitrelli - Minn MN 2001
Copyright 2001 Brian Reichow
brian@casabrian.com http://www.casabrian.com
"It all gives a new viability to rock operas, a form thought to have died with the Electric Light Orchestra and Yes. But the orchestra with rock guitar is the sound of Broadway these days. The mix we have has the heavy rock elements that keep the younger kids interested, along with the classical elements that make the heavier rock acceptable to older people. We've found a mix that works for everyone.''
---Bob Kinkel |
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TSO East- St Louis 2001
photo by George Haberberger
``The whole sense of family, reconciliation, getting back with your loved ones is the main theme of Christmas Eve, and it's having so much more impact this year [after Sept 11th, 2001]. People really need those things now, that sense of family. It's nice, too, that people come to the show to lose themselves for two hours and come out feeling good.''
---Bob Kinkel |
Paul O'Neill -photo by Kerry
"Robert and I had been producing and writing for a number of years with various rock groups. We were always looking for ways to make the music have greater and greater emotional impact. We tried to write the music that was so melodic it didn't need lyrics. And lyrics that were so poetic that they didn't need music, but once you put the two of them together, the sum of the parts would be greater than the whole, and you couldn't imagine them apart. Once we'd done this, we were still looking for a way to take it to even greater heights, and we realized that putting the songs within the context of a story would give it a third dimension that would allow us to do that. Hence we started writing not just albums but rock operas. We realized then that there was an inherent problem recording rock operas within the standard rock 'n' roll band makeup. Rock operas by their nature need the voices to change as the characters change. Rock bands normally only have one (or if you're lucky) two great vocalists to work with, therefore limiting how far you can go. You're forced to make the music fit the band, as opposed to allowing the music to go wherever it needs to. With Trans-Siberian Orchestra, first the music is created with no artificial limitations and then we seek out, within classical, rock, Broadway and R&B worlds, the very best singers and musicians to bring each song to life. This also in many ways forces us to operate on a higher level. This environment has the added benefit of causing a cross pollination of musical ideas, creating hybrid forms of music that normally never would have occurred, such as an R&B singer doing a classical-style melody and bringing gospel touches to it that cause it to glitter in ways that even the creators could not have predicted..." --- Paul O'Neill |
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Honorable Mention: Michael Crawford
Probably best known for his role as the Phantom in Phantom of the Opera and his show, EFX, Michael Crawford may seem an unlikely addition to the Trans-Siberian Orchestra. But then, TSO is anything but "likely". Mr. Crawford's melodic voice fits right in as he does an outstanding performance of Oh Holy Night on the Ghost of Christmas Eve video. (for video clip, please visit Phantom Movie.com)
Kudos to TSO for breaking down the barriers of music and opening us up to a whole new experience! |
TSO East - 2002
"Cleveland is sort of the adopted home of the production," says David Krebs, who manages the group. Krebs made his name working with hard rock artists like Aerosmith and Ted Nugent, so it's no surprise to find his fingerprints on this production. "We tried to keep some of that same energy. It's a very powerful blending of rock and roll and theater. It's got its own kind of essence live."
--- Cleveland Scene
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TSO East - 2002
"It's a mixture of classical and rock and a lot of other genres all mingled together, all with a great story. We'd like to take it to the next step past something like "[Jesus Christ] Superstar," which I worship. It was definitely worth it, trying to get the combined impact of a rock show and of a theatrical experience like "Phantom Of The Opera." I think we're getting there..."
---Paul O'Neill |
TSO East 2002
"...Actually, while there is the orchestral component to the show, it also features a chorus and, a heavy metal ensemble performing conceptual Christmas music with a rock-opera twist. It's kinda like the Boston Pops playing an adapted version of "Jingle Bells" with Judas Priest in tuxedos, but less extreme..."
--- WV Dominion Post |
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