Hello my friends,It has been a while since I got any time to write to you. I am truly sorry for that There has been many people already requesting me to do this… so now when I finished my interviews for today (in the car on my way home from the airport), I am finally free.So this is the first thing and last that I am doing before officially starting my holidays!!I came back to Finland after magnificent tour just a couple of hours ago. It feels good to be back at home. The last concert in London gave us just amazing end for it. Everything worked perfect during the concert and we just had a lot of fun. It has been interesting for us to see that every concert has felt better than the previous one for us as musicians. Getting more and more into the spirit of the songs and being able to make a stronger connection with the fans every time.Anyway, the feeling was quite sad after the last concert because we truly are going to miss each other. There was something very special going on for 4 weeks among us. Everybody agrees on that.It has been very unusual for me to be saluted every day by everybody involved in the shows (production, crew, musicians) with hugs and kisses same way that every night after the day was over.No ass faces around, just smiles and laughter. No silence and indifference, but warmness, long chats and stories of every kind and true interest.Above all, respect within the group of people for everybody’s work and music.None of us needed to be dragged into a hotel room after alcohol overdoses Is very unique the feeling of looking into the eyes of the people working with you and finding there honesty.These Warm Up concerts were a great Xmas present for all of us. But this is just the beginning for something else to come. We are going to work together once again pretty soon, so we just have to be patient. I will miss the jokes of Mike, hugs and laughter of Alex, positive vibes of Doug, great girl chats with Maria, serious conversations with Max and Markus and sister kind of love of my own brother Toni. Thank you all!Without forgetting the whole amazing crew: Antti, Hemi, Pete, Tommi and Cedric and my friend Heidi. Without you there would not be any shows and I wouldn’t be able to sing my music to anybody. A big thanks you for your efforts and understanding!The tour has been fantastic, seriously. I have never felt happier. The band, the music, the crew, the travelling, the fans…everything just great. This whole year has been a good year for me as an artist but also as a person. I have gained pretty much self-confidence, but most of all I have enjoyed to be an artist on my own. The success feels now very personal and every tiny positive thing means to me a lot more than before.
It was “pretty†cold and wet day and since we were shooting outside, I was really nervous to get sick. We had some problems with the generators, we were not having any electricity and the darkness surrounded us for almost 2 hours! That was pretty funny for everybody. The shootings started at 14:00 pm and lasted until 07:30 next morning. On that day I flew to Cologne and had a show at night. After the show in Cologne we travelled very early in the morning to Paris and had a show on that night there. Basically I didn’t sleep for 3 days! I wonder how on earth I was able to stay awake and to make these shows happen I guess the reason is YOU.The video is ready now and it looks great, so I hope everybody of you will enjoy it.I am sure that soon it will be announced in mywinterstorm.com when you will be able to see it.
Live 4 Metal: What kind of reception has the new album got? You're number one in Finland so it must be good!Tarja: Very good news! Also number 3 in Germany — for me it's a blast, and a really important moment. Because of course it's my first album so I feel it very personally; it's a personal success to think that all the hard work and paid off, and this is a great moment in my life as I am growing a lot as an artist and a person in this process. I cannot complain as this is a good beginning, even though yesterday I was talking with some fans and they saw it as a continuum for me.Live 4 Metal: Who or what are your influences on this album?Tarja: Mainly the people have been my biggest influence. There has been a big blast of energy behind me and I call the people my "winter storm." They have been the biggest influence holding me there and kicking my ass and it's very important. Also, I have been reading Paulo Coelho's books a lot, and I like his view of life in general. I like how he talks about living in a dream. He has helped me for many years with his way of seeing things, which helped me to understand myself better. It's very important to feel that inner good feeling. Life can sometimes be pretty tough for an artist considering the moment you are living in. Bad vibes from the environment get to you. Now I understand that there is nothing bad in life that can't make you stronger, but can make you understand who you are and what you want to do with your life, and I live my life in a way that I am following my dreams. Not in the way that they can come true though — it would be very sad if I had big goals in life, such as singing in the Royal Albert Hall, and then I do it, and it's gone! I don't have those kinds of dreams, I have dreams to live and stay positive. Like, I'm really looking forward to tonight's concert — that is my dream once again. There will be some familiar faces for me but also hopefully some new people.Live 4 Metal: How much have you gone for a metal or rock sound on the new album, or is it more classical? With what kind of ratio are the genres applied?Tarja: The album is a mixture of things. As an artist, there is nothing better that the opportunity to go on stage and headbang with hard-sounding guitars. I love it so much that I feel it in my bones and it bursts out as a massive sound. I love it, it's fantastic, but on the other hand a couple of songs later are so smooth and quiet with beautiful melodies and harmonies, giving people a different perspective and atmosphere. That is a challenge for me that I have being doing for many years. I love that contrast. I love that if I do a solely heavy metal concert, I can go to an opera festival two days later and do an opera concert.Live 4 Metal: Are you a metal fan, or is your listening more opera-based?Tarja: Both. Actually I do not listen to much opera music. I listen to classical music when I need to relax. It depends a lot on mood. I go to metal concerts as well as classical concerts, and I love both of them. When I need some energy in the morning I can put a metal CD in my player, because it gets me going! Classical music will send me off the road! [Laughs] Seriously, my interest in both sorts of music, I have been doing them for so many years that neither of them tells the complete story of me as an artist, but together they do. Live 4 Metal: So why did you choose ALICE COOPER's "Poison" of all the tracks in the world to cover?Tarja: Good question! [Laughs] This happened because it was a coincidence - I wanted to have one cover for the album and it was so difficult to make the decision. You wouldn't believe how much good music is composed and how many great artists there are. Always when I was searching for a song, I was led to the 80s and my teenage years when I was listening to hard rock. I was having some trouble! In May or April, I was driving along in Finland and on my car radio they were playing ALICE COOPER four or five times in one day. I was laughing about how when I was driving they were playing this song again and again, so I started playing around with crazy ideas. What if I do a cover of this? What kind of cover should it be? How should I make it fit around the sound of the album for me as a singer. There were many things I was playing around with. And it was definitely not an easy song - there are hundreds of backing vocals and guitar riffs. I said to myself I don't have any guitar solos on my album, just cello solos. So there will be a cello solo in this one too! The record company truly loved this song, and my idea of it, and it started to work. It was a good thing, I really like this track. Read the entire interview at www.live4metal.com.
The songs of My Winter Storm After I chose the first songs for the album among the many I received, I found a strange connection in their lyrics. A certain story popped up from the songs. Some key words appeared in more than one song and some of the songs exposed a sort of different characters in their lyrics. With few changes, nearly every song seemed to fit this story very nicely.At the same time, the story is very vague and the songs are still not connected with each other in any way. You can listen any of the songs out of the album and it will make sense on its own. But at the beginning it was easier to focus in the red line going through the album and was very inspiring for the kind of sound that I was looking for in every song. Also it helped me to create new songs for the album since I had a nice story in my head already from the beginning. Die alive This is a song about living every moment of your life fully. Is a fight song without any swords or blood. A fight to do what you want to do in your life, in a way that if you die tomorrow, you die alive.Not like many people that are already dead while they are still living. Jim Dooley added the feeling of a movie trailer in the middle part of the song. Lost northern star This was composed in Ibiza together with Michelle and Kiko. I wanted to have a heavier song in the album with more operatic vocals. It took some days to come up with this song and in the end the song has 74 tracks of vocals! I had a lot of fun in creating harmonies and strange sounds with my voice. Mel Wesson added more power to the song with his crazy sounds. The story in the lyrics is beautiful, even though the music itself is really massive.We definitely like Rammstein and as homage I sang the line “my soul burns†that you would find familiar if you follow the band. Sing for me I received the song when the band was nearly done with the recordings of the album in Ireland. I heard it and immediately loved it. It fits perfectly to the complete sound and idea of the album with its orchestral and choir arrangements, spooky mood and gorgeous melodies.This was one of the few songs that I didn’t change at all, which is quite amazing considering that I received it so late. Minor Heaven I have been asked already what means Minor Heaven. I don’t think this question has an answer. MH is what you want it to be. I fell in love with the melody and I imagined the song as one of the beautiful lieds that I have been performing in my classical concerts. I asked my dear friend Izumi to play piano to reinforce that idea of mine.The song evolves into a bigger sound with orchestra and guitars and I do like the combination of them very much. Our great divideIn my career I have performed several great ballads. I love ballads and I was looking for a song where I could feel myself free and flow with the music.Anders and Mattias played me an amazing melody and I added my touch to some parts of the song. We wrote the lyrics with Hanne during beautiful sunrises in Ibiza. It started as a love song…but I cannot say where it ended. Boy and the Ghost The song represents the dark spirit of the album. BATG grows little by little in an unexpected way that becomes massive and mind blowing. It has a strange and mysterious story in its lyrics. Music flows like in a musical. Is the best companion to Sing For Me. Like two parts of a same song, both in music and lyrics. Poison This Alice Cooper classic is still very much played in the rock radios in Finland. The lyrics are very funny if you consider a woman singing them. I cannot reveal myself as a die-hard fan from Alice Cooper, but I always liked this one and it also brings me back to my years as a teenager.We did quite many backing vocals in the studio with my friend Tea, my brother Toni and Daniel, the producer of the album. The original song has already a huge amount of backing vocals and it definitely took some time to get them done. We produced the song to fit to the complete picture and sound of My Winter Storm.Mel Wesson did amazing ambience sounds and Alex, Doug, Earl, Torsten and Daniel were working very hard in the studio to make it sound fresh, but faithful to the original at the same time. My Little PhoenixWhen I received this song I liked that is was different than the others. It has a waltz structure what it is unusual for a rock song.I already visualised from the demo the way the song should turn. It was the hardest one to explain to the Producer and musicians what I wanted to achieve…It took for everybody until the complete song was close to be ready to finally understand it. Now is among everybody’s favourites.I am absolutely happy with the result. Mel Wesson and Jim Dooley, once again, did an outstanding job in this one!Still is a hard song to explain in words. You need to listen to it. I walk alone This song was among the first ones I received. The song is inspired by a theme from Mozart’s Requiem. I immediately thought this song could match perfectly my identity and personality as a singer, having a background in classical music. It was hard to decide the final direction that the song should take. We started to make some experiments in the studio with a version having more guitars and another one with more orchestra. The original idea was to choose one of them, but in the end I liked both so much that when the record company suggested IWA as the first single, they saved my day! We are releasing those 2 versions as 2 separate singles so that I won’t need to choose. Oasis Is the only song I composed alone for the album. I felt the song name “Oasis†very strongly as the picture I tried to paint. Even though I wrote Finnish lyrics for the song, I decided to keep the original name.The feelings and emotions are the most important components of this song.Oasis tells about inner freedom, happiness and peace. Every one of us should be able to find that peace of mind when needed. Calling graceMWS is an album that will drive you through different emotions. Atmosphere is dark and strong so I was looking for a quiet outro for the album. A piece of music that allows you to relax and leaves you with a pleasant mood.I thought that an acoustic guitar song was the best thing to do.When we were in Ibiza arranging other songs I told everybody about this idea. Immediately and very spontaneously we started to jam with an acoustic guitar with Kiko and Michelle. A couple of days later the song was ready and it didn’t change much from those days to the final recordings.I am happy to have Kiko Loureiro (to have 2 Kiko’s involved in the same song is already unusual) playing acoustic guitar. He gives definitely an additional flavour that I was looking for and a marvellous ending for MWS. Damned and divine This song was created by Torsten Stenzel, Angela Heldmann, Adrian Zagoritis and me. They made a demo of a basic track, which they showed to me. Usually I need some time for a song to grow in me, but this case was different. I felt the song strong. I added the vocal melodies and suggested few changes in the lyrics.It feels that D&D has been taken from a vampires’ movie. Dark, sad, gentle and beauty. When we started to work the song in the studio with Daniel and the band, everybody loved the song and wanted to take part of it. We ended up making two versions of D&D and producing them as different songs. The ReignQuiet and beautiful atmospheres that can be heard in certain film music inspired this song.I met Torsten Stenzel in Ibiza to discuss some ideas for a song he sent me for my new album. I immediately felt a strong connection between us so I asked him to play keyboards on My Winter Storm album. I played some soundtracks I love, for him and explained what kind of mood I was looking for. We ended up composing 2 new songs together; The Reign is one of them.My first approach for this song was to have it as an instrumental for the album.When Torsten presented his first ideas, we thought of using my voice as an instrument, without any lyrics. I sang some vocal melodies with that in mind. After we recorded the first demo of the song, it became apparent to us that The Reign should also tell a story. Together with Angela Heldmann and Adrian Zagoritis, I ended up writing the dreamy lyrics for it around a story I already had in my mind. It is fair to say that The Reign was partially inspired by Paulo Coelho’s book “The Alchemistâ€.The amazing orchestral arrangements, composed by Jim Dooley, truly captured the spirit and lyrics of “The reign.†The Wonderful Martin Tillman played the beautiful cello parts. Ciarán´s WellFor my Winter Storm album, we recorded the drums, bass and guitars in Ireland. Having had such a great time, I wanted to capture musically, the essence of my experience. This is the only song we composed in Ireland.It was amazing to see Doug Wimbish and Alex Scholpp jamming every day between the albums recordings. I loved some of the guitar riffs from those moments, and asked Alex to record them for me. I wanted to have a song to head-bang on stage! Ciarán’s well was born in a very spontaneous way. The name refers to one of the hundreds of Holy wells from Ireland. One in particular that was near our studio and holds many magical stories.It was actually very hard for me to include my own personality in this song. I wanted this song not to be too ambitious, a bit funny, and even at times, crazy. Something that can put a smile on your face. So I asked Michelle Leonard to give me a hand. Michelle and I did two other songs together for my winter storm. It was a lot of fun to write the lyrics and vocal melodies with her in the middle of the night in a hotel room in Hamburg, and I think everything worked out wonderfully!
Dimitris Kontogeorgakos de Metal-Temple.com condujo recientemente una entrevista con el conocido batería Mike Terrana (TARJA TURUNEN, AXEL RUDI PELL, TONY HERNANDO y MASTERPLAN, y ex RAGE, YNGWIE... entre otros). Aquí teníéis un par de extractos de la conversación: Metal-Temple.com: Has editado un DVD instructivo llamado "Rhythm Of The Beast". ¿Cuál es la respuesta hasta ahora? Terrana: Bueno, parece que a la gente le está gustando y estoy impresionado con lo que he hecho. Sin embargo, alguna gente me ha malinterpretado porque piensan que estoy intentando impresionarles con sólos de batería, pero para mí sólo es una manera de expresarme, y es realmente divertido de hacer porque así tienes la oportunidad de jugar con la audiencia... Y esto parecía que era un problema cuando estaba trabajando con RAGE porque ellos no me daban mi espacio y además no querían incluir sólo de batería en los conciertos porque pensaban que era algo aburrido, con lo que dije "vale", pero luego en el estudio tambiíén estaban cuantificando mi batería y tapando algunas partes con samplers, y esto si que me parecía un sacrilegio. Es que si tienes a un tío que puede tocar duro la batería y además tiene un ritmo y sonido especial, ¡díéjale tocar! No quiero parecer un ogro con respecto a esto pero es la razón por la que dejíé RAGE, por razones artísticas: me sentía menospreciado como músico y eso no es justo. ¿Cuáles son tus planes actuales? Estás metido una vez más en multitud de proyectos, con MASTERPLAN, con ARTENSION, en directo con TARJA... Terrana: De hecho, he participado en 12 discos el año pasado, y en 2008 haríé un montón de clinics de batería, grabaríé el nuevo trabajo de MASTERPLAN y AXEL RUDI PELL, otro trabajo con Tony Hernando, un disco de fusión con un guitarrista belga y Tony Levin, el bajista de Peter Gabriel... Por ejemplo en Abril volveríé a estar de gira con TARJA, tambiíén haríé festivales con AXEL RUDI PELL en verano y seguiríé tocando con mi banda de fusión, TABOO VOODOO... ¿Y tienes tiempo para todo? Terrana: Sí, aunque realmente me busco el tiempo para todo esto. El año pasado contratíé a una persona para que me organizara todas estas cosas porque hay ciertos aspectos del negocio que se escapan a mi control y además yo no soy capaz de coordinar todas las cosas, ¡es demasiado! Ahora íél está trabajando en organizar mi agenda y esto hace las cosas menos estresantes tanto para mí como para todos los que trabajan conmigo. OK, hemos llegado a la última pregunta, que a su vez es la menos seria: ¿Quiíén te puso el apodo de "el batería más sexy del mundo". Terrana: Tengo que decir que fui yo mismo quien tuvo la idea porque nadie me había dicho nunca que fuera sexy, nadie. Mi madre decía que era un bebíé guapo pero no síé lo que pasó a partir de los 5 años, supongo que algo iría mal (risas). Así que lo hice como una broma, ya sabes, porque hay un montón de baterías buenos por el mundo y obviamente no soy el mejor pero así ¡puedo ser el más sexy! Podíéis leer la entrevista completa en Metal-Temple.com.
Tu nuevo disco, "My Winter Storm", está funcionando increíblemente bien en Europa, incluyendo un número uno en tu país nativo, Finlandia. ¿Cómo te sientes?Tarja Turunen: "Al ser mi primer álbum hecho por mí misma, es algo muy personal para mí, pero ha habido diferentes procesos en la elaboración. Pero yo estuve allí desde la decisión de con quiíén iba a trabajar, cómo sonaría el álbum, el estilo musical... Es una gran oportunidad y, de algún modo, el comienzo para mí. Por ejemplo la otra noche estuve hablando con algunos fans y me dijeron que estaban muy felices de que hubiera continuado, pero ya te digo que personalmente lo considero más como un comienzo, por lo que el íéxito del disco es algo fantástico. No quería repetir algo que ya hubiera hecho en el pasado, y por eso es un trabajo diferente con respecto a lo que hubiera sido sencillo de continuar. Por otro lado, está claro que he tomado elementos del pasado, pero quería un disco que me representara realmente como persona".¿No te preocupa el que que esto pueda condicionar que los fans de NIGHTWISH no acepten tan bien el disco?Tarja Turunen: "Por supuesto que va a ser algo nuevo para muchos fans porque no es un álbum de heavy metal, por lo que ha sido para mí un paso difícil pero valiente. De todas formas, en ningún momento pensaba en esto durante el proceso de creación y grabación del disco, sino que me dirigía la pasión y no pensar en el el tipo de álbum que podíamos hacer para satisfacer a los fans. Es en lo que siempre pienso cuando hago música porque si no me siento realmente feliz con ello, no podría llevar mi mensaje así, no sería coherente, y para mí es algo muy importante".El primer single del disco es "I walk alone". ¿Ha sido el lanzamiento del single parte del plan global de presentarte a tí misma como una persona individual? Tarja Turunen: "Mucha gente ha venido y me ha dicho que no camino sola, sino que camino con ellos, y esto es totalmente cierto. En la canción digo: "la tormenta de invierno me mantiene despiertaâ€, pero fueron dos tipos de Suecia los que escribieron la letra, así que no he escrito la canción por mí misma pero me siento realmente identificada con esas líneas. Es una imagen muy bella, pero tambiíén muy poderosa, porque la gente ha estado ahí por y para mí. Los fans son el poder que hay detrás y junto a mí, son los que me han mantenido alerta, los que me mantienen despierta y por eso digo digo que son mi tormenta de invierno. No podría ser yo musicalmente sin ellos, no podría existir mi música sin ellos, y ha sido especialmente en estos dos años en los que ya no he sido parte de tan exitosa banda cuando me he dado cuenta incluso más de todo esto". En el vídeo de la canción te caracterizas con 4 personajes diferentes: El chico muerto, la Reina del Hielo, El Fíénix y la muñeca. ¿Cómo encajan los 4 personajes con la canción e incluso con el álbum?Tarja Turunen: "Fue muy extraño porque hace casi un año y medio surgió la noticia de que iba a hacer un álbum en solitario, y me enviaron muchas canciones que, aunque eran de diferentes compositores. todas tenían que ver con cosas similares. Descubrí esos personajes en las canciones, y pronto comencíé a crear una historia que realmente me ayudara a hacer nueva música. Es una historia muy personal y, aunque no hay realmente un hilo conductor en el disco, ya te digo que me permitió hacer nuevas canciones. Por otro lado, fue muy divertido usar los personajes porque la imagen y la música van al 50% en este disco, y yo siempre he estado muy influenciada por los álbumes conceptuales a este respecto. Por eso quería conectar de alguna manera el disco en sí, con el arte gráfico y los vídeos, y fue fantástico el poder caracterizarme como esos personajes para que incluso la gente que no conociera mi música pudiera ver el vídeo y pensar que al menos era algo interesante y novedoso. De todos modos, lo que más me pregunta la gente todavía es ¡cómo pude interpretar al espeluznante chico muerto!".Podíéis leer la entrevista completa en esta dirección. http://soundshock.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=378&Itemid=53
