Enya

Enya (born 17 May 1961), birth name Eithne N? Bhraon?in (sometimes seen as the Anglicized Enya Brennan), is Ireland's best-selling solo musician. As a musical group, Enya is really three people: Enya herself, who composes and performs the music; Nicky Ryan, who produces the records; and Roma Ryan, who writes the lyrics in various languages. Enya is a phonetic approximation of how Eithne is pronounced in her native Irish.

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Musical upbringing

Eithne was born in Gweedore, County Donegal, in Ireland in 1961 to a musical family. Her grandparents were in a band that played throughout Ireland; her father was the leader of the Slieve Foy Band before opening a pub; and her mother played in a dance band and later taught music at the Gweedore Comprehensive School. Eithne has four brothers and four sisters, several of whom formed the band An Clann As Dobhair in 1968. (They renamed the band Clannad in the 1970s.)

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In 1980, Eithne joined Clannad, the band composed of her siblings M?ire, P?l, and Ciar?n and twin uncles Noel and Padraig Duggan. Eithne played the keyboard and provided backing vocals on their albums Crann ?ll (1980) and Fuaim (1982). In 1982 (shortly before Clannad became famous for "Theme From Harry's Game"), producer and manager Nicky Ryan left Clannad and Eithne joined him to start her own solo career.

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Solo career

Eithne, working with Nicky and his wife Roma, recorded two solo instrumental songs called "An Ghaoth ?n Ghrian" ("The Solar Wind") and "Miss Clare Remembers" that were released on the 1984 album Touch Travel. Eithne was first credited as Enya for writing some of the music for the 1984 movie The Frog Prince. She was contracted to provide music for the soundtrack of the 1986 television documentary The Celts. The music she produced was featured on her first solo album, Enya (1987), but it attracted little attention at the time. The song "Boadicea" from this album would later be sampled by The Fugees (1996), causing a brief stir because the group neither sought permission from Enya nor gave her credit initially, and by Mario Winans, who did give her credit. (Ironically the Winans track, "I Don't Wanna Know," which features a rap by P. Diddy and is offically credited to all three artists, became Enya's highest charting single in the US, when it peaked at #2 on the Hot 100 in 2004.)

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Enya achieved a breakthrough in her career in 1988 with the album Watermark, which featured the hit song "Orinoco Flow" (sometimes known as "Sail Away"). "Orinoco Flow" topped the charts in Britain, and the album sold eight million copies. Three years later she followed with another hit album: Shepherd Moons, which sold ten million copies and earned Enya her first Grammy Award. Despite winning Grammys for "Best New Age Album", Enya does not personally classify her music as belonging to that genre. Four years later she released the Grammy-winning The Memory of Trees (1995).

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In 1997 Enya released her greatest hits collection ', which featured two new songs. She was offered the chance to compose the score for James Cameron's 1997 film Titanic, but declined. Cameron subsequently asked composer James Horner to adapt Enya's style for his score. The resulting score was so similar to Enya's work that some sources erroneously credit Enya with the music.

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Following a five year wait, she released A Day Without Rain in 2000 featuring 34 minutes of new material. After the September 11, 2001 attacks, her song "Only Time" (from A Day Without Rain) was used as a backdrop in many radio and TV reports about the attacks. She initially frowned upon this use, especially when many bootlegged versions of "Only Time" mixed with sound effects from the attack began to appear. She agreed to release a special edition of the song with funds going to the families of victims. Many Enya fans, however, are resentful that her music has been linked with the attacks; an example of this occurred on a 2002 appearance on CNN's Larry King Live when images of battle in Afghanistan were shown on screen as she performed "May It Be", a song with no war connection. This sparked some complaints within Enya's fan community.

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Enya is self-admittedly a slow worker when it comes to composing music. As a result, fans have had to wait as long as five years between albums. In 2004, Enya was reputedly working on her next album, but no release date has been set. In September 2004, a new song called "Sumiregusa" was unveiled in Japan as part of an advertising campaign for Panasonic. In announcing the new recording, Warner Music Japan stated that Enya's next album was scheduled for release (in Japan at least) in mid-November. After a brief flurry of excitement among fans, Enya issued a press release on her official Web site on 19 September stating that this was a mistake and no new album is immediately forthcoming.

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Enya's official website in Germany (www.enya.de) has indicated that a new album may be released in November 2005 in Germany.

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On September 23, 2005, Roma Ryan on behalf of Enya announced through the official Enya Forum that the new album, Amarantine, will be released in November, although Warner Music has yet to announce an official date.http://unity.enya.com/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=11520

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On September 29 and October 3 2005, there were two seperate security breaches at Enya's castle, which has already had an estimated ?250,000 spent on security measures http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/4305058.stm http://www.examiner.ie/pport/web/ireland/Full_Story/did-sgmD1yfc0tDmksgdL11Zs5FWAE.asp.

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17 May: REDIRECT May 17...

1961: 1961 was a common year starting on Sunday (link will take you to calendar)....

Anglicized: REDIRECT Anglicisation...

Enya related Images and Photos (experimental)

Enya