A Floyd fan's intro to Trans-Siberian Orchestra

by Dennis Howie

So tell me Christmas
Are we wise
To believe in things we never see
Are prayers just wishes in disguise

What do you get when you take the likes of one who has produced and/or promoted such artists as Aerosmith, Bon Jovi, Madonna and Sting, mix with some of the best session musicians in New York, add in a 60 piece orchestra and a youth choir and set out to make a rock-influenced Christmas album? To discover the answer, all you need is Trans-Siberian Orchestra's Christmas Eve and Other Stories. The vision of Paul O'Neill, this album combines original interpretations of such Christmas standards as O Come All Ye Faithful, O Holy Night, The First Noel, and God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen, with some original compositions punctuated by spectacular lyrics. As a result you have an album that makes not only for refreshingly innovative seasonal listening, but a Christmas album that carries itself well beyond the Christmas season, listenable even on a hot July day.

In a style somewhat reminiscent of Roger Waters' solo material, this album tells a Christmas story, both in the lyrics and the liner notes. In fact, you should review the liner notes prior to listening to the album to get an idea of what the entire story is about. And like Waters' solo material, Christmas Eve and Other Stories gets better each time you listen to it. For any Pink Floyd fans who lament the fact that Pink Floyd never put out a Christmas song (are there any such fans?) other than the small ditty that has circulated as a rarity, this album just might help fill that void.

In speaking of his production standards, O'Neill has said, "With Trans-Siberian Orchestra there's an ideal. The basic notion is that we have to make the best music possible. Whatever has to be done to get the best song, the best lyric, the best arrangement, and then find the person who can best pull it off, that's what's done." Sound like someone we all know?

The tune Christmas Eve/Sarajevo 12/24, originally written for the group Savatage (of which O'Neill and several of the artists appearing on this album were members) and their rock opera release Dead Winter Dead, has actually received considerable airplay on U.S. radio stations during the Christmas season. In fact, TSO has built such a dedicated fan base they have toured Christmas Eve and Other Stories during the Christmas season for the past couple years, playing to sold out houses. I have my tickets for their December 12 performance in Detroit--watch for them somewhere near you!

Then he asked a village peasant
What do Russian hearts desire
He answered peace on earth, of course
And a little "Stolichnaya"

The story of the album begins with an angel coming down to earth on Christmas Eve in the 1990's searching for "the one thing that best represents everything good that has been done in the name of this day." The angel searches the globe, visiting battlefields and villages in such places as Sarajevo, Belfast, Burundi, Rwanda, and Palestine. At first he finds nothing but the misery present in those places.

As he flew o'er Sarajevo
There were scars upon the land
There were scars upon the people
It was hard to understand

And the deepest scars of all
Which to humans are unseen
But the angel could see clearly
Were the scars upon the dreams

As the angel keeps searching, he discovers the magic of Christmas music and the hopes and feelings it stirs in people, even in the most desperate of situations. It is at this point in the album that Paul O'Neill presents his rock-influenced interpretations of Christmas standards. From the screaming guitars in an instrumental version of O Holy Night to incredibly rocking tidbits of Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker, O'Neill breathes new life into otherwise worn standards.

As the angel continues searching, he comes across the prayer of a father who is regretting a quarrel that drove his daughter away. His prayer is to have his daughter back home on Christmas day. The angel is moved by the father's prayer, and sets out to find the daughter. He finds her cold and lonely on a street in a less-than-desirable part of New York, wishing upon a neon sign that she were back home.

In an attempt to work a small Christmas miracle, the angel enters a dingy neighborhood bar. He speaks to the patrons and the bar owner, and in a moment of compassion, the bar owner takes the cash from the register drawer, goes outside, hails a cab, gives the girl the cash, and sends her to the airport to be on her way home to her father. As he returns to the comfort of his bar, a true miracle occurs when he informs the patrons that drinks are on the house for the rest of the evening.

If you want to arrange it
This world you can change it
If we could somehow make this
Christmas thing last

By helping a neighbor
Or even a stranger

And to know who needs help
You need only just ask

Told through O'Neill's original compositions, the story concludes with the touching reunion of the father with his daughter on Christmas day. The angel then takes the Christmas magic he found on earth -- the heart of a song, the tear of a child, and the wish of a soul -- back to the Lord, and the Lord smiles at him.

"The message in Christmas Eve is keep an eye out for each other and never underestimate the impact of a single act of kindness, no matter how small it may seem," relates O'Neill. In my opinion, O'Neill succeeds in delivering his message in an album that is destined to become a Christmas classic in its own right.

If our kindness
This day is just pretending
If we pretend long enough
Never giving up
It just might be who we are

Dennis Howie is a staff writer for Spare Bricks.

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