Looking back on 2016

Looking back on 2016, the highlight of this year was the Coldplay concert at Rose Bowl, Los Angeles. Due to the Xylobands it was also an amazing show.

In 2016 several musicians became popular like Alan Walker and Iselin Solheim.

Philipp Poisel mentioned “Zweimal Sommer” twice in his song “Erklär mir die Liebe“.

Also I discovered that Sebastien, a DJ from Hamburg, Germany, is one of the few musicians who is producing remixes which are better than the original, like “Almost Home“.

Finally in the Advent season, I managed to produce “dance” cover versions of traditional Christmas hymns on Soundcloud and on Youtube, each Advent Sunday and on Christmas eve. These are my first steps in music production, hope you like the songs.

Thanks to everyone supporting me on 500px and Soundcloud with likes and follows!
Happy New Year!

Tonight

In the latest season of the music contest “The Voice of Germany”, One Republic presented a very powerful song live on stage, together with one of the candidates Boris Alexander Stein: http://www.the-voice-of-germany.de/video/6-boris-alexander-stein-feat-onerepublic-let-s-hurt-tonight-clip.

I couldn’t get the melody out of my head and found out that it is also the title song of the movie “Collateral Beauty” with Will Smith, Keira Knightley, Kate Winslet and others.

One Republic did a great job with the song “Let’s hurt tonight”. It begins slowly as an acoustic version and finally the pop-rock boosts into the refrain.

This is an extremely well done cover by Michael Lynch. It is very well produced and contains many other tracks than the singer/pianist and guitar player which are seen in the video.

Christmas atmosphere

A Finnair Christmas commercial caught my attention: Not only because of the great filming which nicely represents the warm Christmas atmosphere and points out what is really important, but also because of the music.

The music is written by Leek Soup, Rasputin O’Shaughnessy, Territory Five and Jake Buffalo. The track is called “Another day”, from the album “Summertime Folk”. Great job!

Halleluja!

Update: I now moved this article to Christmas and added the nice Pentatonix version at the end. Merry Christmas!

This is Father Ray Kelly singing “Halleluja”. Amazing!

The video has made him a star.
http://www.christiantoday.com/article/singing.irish.priest.father.ray.kelly.talks.new.album.where.i.belong.exclusive.interview/47585.htm

Find him on iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/artist/father-ray-kelly/id944334956

The song was written by Leonard Cohen, who died on November 7 of this year.

This is the Bon Jovi version.
This is the a capella version of the group Pentatonix.

Christmas: Beside thy cradle

Please enjoy the dance version of “Ich steh an deiner Krippen hier” (Beside thy cradle here I stand). The melody of this traditional German Christmas anthem is from 1736. This is my dance version, produced 280 years later. Merry Christmas!

Soundcloud:

Advent – Gloria

In my project, to produce a cover version of a traditional Advent chorale every Advent weekend, this week please enjoy the dance version of “Les Anges dans nos campagnes”. It is also called “Angels We Have Heard on High” or “Hört der Engel helle Lieder” but the refrain “Gloria, in excelsis Deo” is the same in any language. The melody of this traditional French Christmas carol is from 1842. This is my dance version, produced 174 years later. Happy 4th Advent!

Soundcloud:

Advent – A ship is coming

In my project, to produce a cover version of a traditional Advent chorale every Advent weekend, please enjoy the results of this week: A dance version of “Es kommt ein Schiff geladen” / A ship is coming. It is one of the oldest Advent season melodies from 1608. This is how it sounds more than 400 years later. 🙂


Soundcloud:

Little Drummer

Cold winter – it’s time for warm music. Composed in the year 1941, the song “Little Drummer Boy” was interpreted by many musicians in the meantime. Find here the best versions.

A great a capella version by Pentatonix:

A rap version with Busta Rhymes and Justin Bieber:

A rock version by Sean Quigley:

A version of the legends David Bowie and Bing Cosby (song starts at 1:50 min). It was recorded on 9/11 in the year 1977, just one month before Bing Cosby died:

Advent – Dance version of Open The Gates

Please enjoy my music project of this week: I transformed the beautiful advent hymn “Macht hoch die Tür” into a dance / breakbeat version. I love wobbling basslines and breakbeats so I embedded them in the melodic atmosphere of this church song from the year 1704.
The photo used as Soundcloud cover and in the Youtube video is a night shot I took in 2008 of the magnificent Frauenkirche in Dresden, which was rebuild according to the original plans after it was completely bombed down in second world war. It is such a magnificent church.
If you like my music please support me by giving me a thumbs up on Youtube/Soundcloud!
Turn up the volume and enjoy!

Soundcloud: