Sarah Brightman On New Stream ‘A Christmas Symphony’ and embracing the Christmas Spirit during Pandemic

In the midst of turbulent holiday season defined by a pandemic quarantine, music can be quite strong.

As the world’s best soprano, singer and musician, Sarah Brightman has moved more than 30 million albums, first dealing with the holiday season in songs on the Winter Symphony record in 2008.

Brightman is no stranger to holiday-themed concert tours. But as COVID-19 continues to sustain live music, the singer has had to think outside the box, launching her first live show at the end- this week.

Sarah Brightman: Christmas Symphony It comes from the historic setting of Spitalfields Christ Church London, an English Baroque-style Anglican church restored in the early 1700s. It is a global live streaming event that will be broadcast in four time zones on December 20th and 21st.

“For me, Christmas has always meant a lot. I have a big family and we are very close. So those moments of being together – as I’m sure it is for many other families in the world to celebrate Christmas – are important, ”said Brightman. which, for many, will mean being away from lovers despite the allotted time. “This has been very challenging. I am looking for a lot of people, even close people I know, whose spirits have gone downhill. I just hope everyone takes a look back at this and just accepts what happened, understands it, learns with it and, at the same time, says, ‘It was a blip year sin. We need to move on. ‘”

As well as just running a special holiday program, Brightman’s Christmas live stream was born out of the need to help others during a stronger-than-usual holiday.

In the age of the internet, monetizing recorded music has become more difficult than ever. With live performance off the table forever, many struggle to find work and meet.

For Brightman, it was crucial to get people back to work. But it was just as important to make sure Christmas Symphony there was a charitable component.

In the spirit of giving back, and as a sign of the increasing level of difficulty for charities working through global pandemics, Brightman has partnered with the Global Foodbanking Network, an organization that oversees food banks in more than 40 countries, feeding nearly 17 million people each year.

“Many people have lost their homes. And many people do not have enough food. And that really excites me – and I’m sure everyone else does, ”said Brightman. “So really, what I wanted to do was this streaming event, we were thinking about what charity we could join us and maybe help in some way. somehow. You need to think about others regularly in this situation and be very understanding, ”she said.

“I’m not the most technically savvy person on the planet. But once I got my head around the idea and figured out what I could do, I thought it would be a great way to hire many musicians who did not work hard and hired people in a particular film field with production teams. Even within forecasts, there has been a lot of COVID analysis by COVID analysts. Everyone’s going to be really wide apart, ”said Brightman from the livestream event. “I worked closely with my lighting designer and set man, whom I worked with for years. They have created a beautiful concept in this beautiful old church in old London, in Spitalfield – which is always an interesting area for me. It is a beautiful place to work and the lights are going to be beautiful. It is hymns and songs that lift people’s spirits and make it very spiritual and beautiful. ”

One of the reasons holiday music leads to a warmth is the familiar Christmas canon. But the songs are familiar to artists and fans and, as a result, tend to carry expectations. People expect to hear them in a certain way. That can make it difficult for musicians to come to the material with a new perspective.

For Brightman and company, the way to keep things fun and interesting was to maintain a balance of respect between the old and the new. Bing Crosby’s 1977 television duet with David Bowie on “Peace on Earth / Little Drummer Boy” was an inspiration, a show that featured a visual display as powerful as the sound delivered.

“There is a reason these pieces have stayed so long: because they are so well written. So you can’t move away too much, musically, from them. You may include different things with the arrangements, etc. ”Brightman said.

“For example, there’s a song I made by Andrew Lloyd Webber that he wrote years ago – for a film called Odessa file. It was really set within a Christmas scene in that movie. He wrote ‘Christmas Dream’ with Tim Rice. We’ve been working on the arrangement and giving it a completely different flavor – including bells and all sorts of things that it didn’t have in the original recording of it. And sung with a different perspective, ”said Brightman of an Andrew Lloyd Webber performance which will take place during the Christmas Symphony special. “I also sing ‘Silent Night.’ People have different ways of doing ‘Silent Night’. But I always felt that simplicity conveys the best message. And I have a unique voice that works well with that. So I’m just working with them in the way I like working with those pieces. And they are always a little different than we used to know when we sang it in church around Christmas at that time. “

The remake of “The Christmas Dream” is the result of a pandemic, as Brightman and Webber changed attitudes at socially remote park sessions while walking their dogs in New York City.

But Lloyd Webber is not the only guest. The live stream will also feature a full orchestra, Trinity College choir, Gregorian choir and Welsh singer Aled Jones, who had a voice on a remake of “Walking in the Air,” in the middle by Howard Blake with the animated 1982 British TV film The Snowman, which climbed UK records again in 1985 thanks to Jones’ voice.

“It was a personal thing because I love the film The Snowman. It is something that brings me back to innocence and as a child growing up through Christmases in Britain. That film really captures that. It is very special. So it will be great for Aled to come on the show, ”Brightman explained. “He will play his part as an adult. And the part he sang as a child will be sung by a loving choir called Leo. He is only a little boy but he sings beautifully. So that’s a good view for him. I think it’s just going to be a beautiful, magical night. This is an evening I would like to see just before Christmas. And I hope everyone else enjoys it. ”

Limited merchandise is available to accompany this weekend’s holiday live stream. And, with tour dates set to take place next winter in support of her twelfth studio album Hymn, Brightman is looking forward to what lies ahead in 2021.

Fertile chorarantine among coronavirus pandemic, the speaker remains optimistic despite uncertain times.

“I became a little nervous about things. And, really, this time also gave me time to work on my calls. Often, as a touring artist, you don’t get much time to do that. So I was able to work hard and discover things I could do that I never thought I could, ”said Brightman, who already sings there. the range includes more than three eights. “I think we all move as artists very quickly. Because we are so desperate to get out of it. Our way of spending our lives is about communication – we communicate with our music in any form. And without that, we somehow die. We become very depressed. This is what we do. So I think we are just trying to go and we will be very happy to do what we can to make it all happen again. “