Enigma (musical project)
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| Enigma | ||
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 Screenshot from "Mea Culpa (Part II)"
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| Background information | ||
| Origin | Germany | |
| Genre(s) | Ambient Electronic House New Age Trance |
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| Years active | 1990–present | |
| Label(s) | Virgin Schallplatten (Germany) EMI (International) Charisma (United States) |
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| Associated acts |
Deep Forest Delerium Enya Era Gregorian Jean Michel Jarre Mike Oldfield Vangelis |
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| Website | http://www.enigma.de/ | |
| Members | ||
| Michael Cretu (1990-present) | ||
| Former members | ||
| Sandra Cretu (1990-2003) Jens Gad (1997-2003) Peter Cornelius (1990-1994) David Fairstein (1990-1997) Frank Peterson (1990-1991) |
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| Notable instrument(s) | ||
| Shakuhachi (synthesized) | ||
Enigma is an electronic musical project started by Michael Cretu, his wife Sandra Cretu, David Fairstein and Frank Peterson in 1990. Michael is both the composer and the producer; Sandra often provides vocals on Enigma tracks. The pair have also worked together under the name Sandra. Six studio albums have been produced under the name of the project.
Contents |
[edit] History
From the late 1970s onwards, Michael Cretu already had his own music career on his hands and apart from several collaboration efforts with several other musicians, he also produced his wife's albums. Before Enigma, he released a number of albums under his own name, but none of them sold particularly well. Cretu revealed in an interview that he believed that his ideas were soon running out at that point.
It was then that Cretu plotted the creation of a "New age-Dance", un-named yet, first single. Ditching his old habits and rules, he headed onto a different direction and in December 1990, after 8 months of preparations, he came up with the project's groundbreaking debut album, MCMXC a.D. (received over 60 platinum awards worldwide). The album was Cretu's first commercial success through the single "Sadeness (Part I)", which juxtaposed Gregorian chants and sexual overtones over a dance beat that was highly peculiar to the ears of the public at that time. Cretu explained that the album was about unsolved crimes and philosophical themes such as life after death, hence the name Enigma. He had previously used a Gregorian-type chant on the opening seconds of Sandra's 1987 single "Everlasting Love", without integrating them into other parts of the song. "Sadeness" quickly rose to the top of the charts in Germany and France; it went on to become an almost worldwide hit.
Before the album was released, Cretu was cautious of the response towards the upcoming album, decided to forgo mentioning his and most of the personnel's real name and credited himself as Curly M.C., while the album sleeve contained little information about the background of the project, furthering the mystery about the creators of the album and leading to speculation whether Enigma was a band, a person or a group.
In 1993, Cretu was given an offer by producers to compose the full soundtrack of the motion picture Sliver but he was unable to accept the offer. Instead, he came up with "Carly's Song" and "Carly's Loneliness", which was used in the movie and credited in the motion picture soundtrack as well.
In the following year, The Cross of Changes was released and it received about the same, if not an even larger and better response from the public (it sold 6 million copies in a year). However, both of the albums also hitched up lawsuits over the issue of sampling from other music sources.
In 1996, Le Roi Est Mort, Vive Le Roi! (French for "The King is dead, long live the king!") was released. Cretu's idea was that this third album was the child of the previous two albums, and therefore included familiar elements of Gregorian chants and tribal chants in it. Though the album was as meticulously crafted by Cretu as the earlier two albums, it failed to achieve the same level of success that they enjoyed. As a result only two of the three singles originally slated were released, with the third one ("The Roundabout") being silently cancelled in 1998.
The 1999 release of The Screen Behind the Mirror included samples from Carl Orff's Carmina Burana on four tracks on the album. This time the Gregorian chants were toned down a lot, but still Shakuhachi flutes and other traditional Enigma signatures remain. Only "Gravity of Love" and "Push the Limits" were released as singles from the album. Ruth-Ann Boyle from the band Olive and also Andru Donalds mark their first appearance on the Enigma project.
In 2001, Cretu released a new single called "Turn Around" together with Love Sensuality Devotion: The Greatest Hits and Love Sensuality Devotion: The Remix Collection to end what he considers to be the first chapter of Enigma. A light show was held at the Munich Planetarium in conjunction of the release of the compilation albums.
2003's Voyageur was considered by many to be a total makeover for the project. Practically all of the prominent Enigma signature elements (the ethnic and/or Gregorian chants, the famous Shakuhachi flutes) were no longer in use for this album. As a result many fans had difficulty appreciating this new direction and sales were affected. From a statistical point of view, every Enigma studio album to date has sold roughly half of what the previous release did.
On August 28, 2005, Enigma's management (Crocodile-Music.de) announced the release of the project's latest single, "Hello and Welcome". The single was originally slated to be released in October, however it was moved to November 25, 2005 and finally saw release in Germany on March 10, 2006. The song will also be the walk-in music for the German boxer, Felix Sturm, and much like Voyageur shows little similarity to earlier Enigma works.
On September 26, 2006, Enigma's sixth album A Posteriori was released worldwide, containing a new version of "Hello and Welcome" and the new song "Goodbye Milky Way", which, despite earlier announcements, was and will not be released as single. The album is more techno, electronic, than any previous one. The concept is based on such sciences as astronomy, physics, history and sociology.[citation needed]
A DVD version of A Posteriori was released on December 16, 2006. The DVD features kaleidoscope images in synchronization with the multi channel remastered music.
[edit] Influence
Cretu's first two studio albums also led to the creation and popularity of bands and musical groups that follow similar styles as Cretu. Era and Gregorian (led by former Enigma member Frank Peterson) are among some notable groups which capitalised songs which heavily incorporate Gregorian chants in their works. Enigma and Deep Forest are also to be considered by many to have brought the tribal chant genre to the ears of the public.
Critics and fans have noted down the probable influences if not similarities of Enigma and the works of other notable musicians. Some examples include Delerium's Semantic Spaces album, Mike Oldfield's albums, The Songs of Distant Earth and Tubular Bells III, all B-Tribe's albums and Sarah Brightman's cover of Hooverphonic's song, "Eden".
Several prominent songs from the project have appeared on notable TV shows and movies, such as:
- "Beyond the Invisible" in the TV series, La Femme Nikita.
- "Return to Innocence" in an episode of the TV series, The Outer Limits.
- "Return to Innocence" in the end credits of the movie, Man of the House.
- "Return to Innocence" and "Sadeness (Part I)" in the movie, Exit to Eden.
- "Return to Innocence" in an episode of the TV series, My So-Called Life.
- "Return to Innocence" in an episode of the TV series, Cold Case (Episode Sanctuary (2006)).
- "Sadeness (Part I)" in the movie, Boxing Helena.
- "Sadeness (Part I)" in the movie, Charlie's Angels.
- "Sadeness (Part I)" in the teaser trailer for the movie 1492: Conquest of Paradise.
- "Principles of Lust" in the movie, Single White Female.
- "Carly's Song", "Carly's Loneliness" and "Principles of Lust" in the movie, Sliver.
- "The Eyes of Truth" in the worldwide movie trailer for The Matrix and The Long Kiss Goodnight.
- "I Love You ... I'll Kill You" in the movie, Money Talks, and the trailer for the movie Eraser.
- "Smell of Desire" in the preview trailer for the movie Bounce.
- "Sadeness (Part I) in the comedy T.V Show Chappelle's Show.
- "Gravity Of Love" In the trailer for The Scorpion King.
"Return to Innocence" also appeared in numerous TV commercials around the world, including one for Virgin Atlantic.
[edit] Sampling and lawsuits
In 1994, Cretu was sued by Munich-based choir Kapelle Antiqua and its record label, Polydor Germany for infringing its "right of personality" through distortion in the samples used in "Sadeness (Part I)" and "Mea Culpa". While the musical composition was in the public domain, the recording by Kapelle Antiqua was copyrighted. European law also recognizes droit moral rights in works that American copyright does not.
Cretu was not spared over the issue of sampling when in 1998, Kuo Ying-nan and Kuo Hsiu-chu from Taiwan's Ami tribe filed a suit over uncredited vocals in "Return to Innocence". Both of the lawsuits have since been settled, but besides compensation and acknowledgement on the source of samples on both lawsuits, the anonymity that Cretu intended to keep after the release of the first album was shattered due to the first lawsuit.
Burned by the lawsuits, the samples used in the production of the third and fourth studio album, Le Roi Est Mort, Vive Le Roi! and The Screen Behind the Mirror were credited properly this time and Cretu's fifth album, Voyageur contained no samples at all.
[edit] Discography
- For a more detailed discography, including chart positions, sales and awards, bootleg albums and other releases, see Enigma discography.
[edit] Studio albums
- MCMXC a.D. (1990)
- The Cross of Changes (1993)
- Le Roi Est Mort, Vive Le Roi! (1996)
- The Screen Behind the Mirror (1999)
- Voyageur (2003)
- A Posteriori (2006)
[edit] Compilation albums
- Trilogy (1998)
- Love Sensuality Devotion: The Greatest Hits (2001)
- Love Sensuality Devotion: The Remix Collection (2001)
- 15 Years After (2005)
[edit] Singles
- "Sadeness (Part I)" (1990)
- "Mea Culpa (Part II)" (1990)
- "Principles of Lust" (1991)
- "The Rivers of Belief" (1991)
- "Carly's Song" (1993)
- "Return to Innocence" (1993)
- "The Eyes of Truth" (1994)
- "Age of Loneliness" (1994)
- "Out from the Deep" (1994)
- "Beyond the Invisible" (1996)
- "T.N.T. for the Brain" (1997)
- "Gravity of Love" (1999)
- "Push the Limits" (2000)
- "Turn Around" (2001)
- "Voyageur" (2003)
- "Following the Sun" (2003)
- "Boum-Boum" (2004)
- "Hello and Welcome" (2006)
- "Goodbye Milky Way" (2006)
[edit] DVDs
- Remember the Future (2001)
- MCMXC a.D.: The Complete Video Album (2003)
- A Posteriori (2006)
[edit] See also
- List of number-one dance hits (United States)
- List of artists who reached number one on the US Dance chart
[edit] External links
- (German) Enigma.de – Official website of Enigma.
- (German) Crocodile-Music.de – Official Enigma management website.
- (English) EnigmaMusic.com – Enigma fansite (maintained by Martyn Wooley), has extensive news and discography,
- (English) Five.no/enigma – Enigma fansite (maintained by Joar Grimstvedt), has extensive list of discography and news.
- (English) Enigma Songs description Enigma Songs explained in detail.
| Modern musical projects based on Gregorian chant and other chants |
|---|
| Aereda • Cantara • Divine Works • Elbosco • Enigma • E Nomine • Era • E.S. Posthumus • Gala • Gregorian • Industrial Monk • Lesiëm • Libera • Magna Canta • Mysteria • Nostradamus • Richard Souther (Vision and Illumination) • Solyma |
Categories: Articles with unsourced statements | All articles with unsourced statements | Enigma | German electronic music groups | House music groups | Ambient music groups | Techno music groups | Trance music groups | German musical groups | Romanian musical groups | New Age musicians | 1990s music groups | 2000s music groups | Musical groups founded by married couples
