''Unplugged'' is an acoustic live album by Canadian musician

Bryan Adams Bryan Guy Adams (born 5 November 1959) is a Canadian musician, singer, songwriter, composer, and photographer. He has been cited as one of the best-selling music artists of all time, and is estimated to have sold between 75 million and mor ...

. The album was recorded completely on September 26, 1997, at the

Hammerstein Ballroom The Hammerstein Ballroom is a ballroom located within the Manhattan Center at 311 West 34th Street in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. The capacity of the ballroom is dependent on the configuration of the room; it seats 2,500 people for theat ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

. Recorded by David Hewitt and Bob Clearmountain on the Remote Recording Silver Truck. Adams was joined by Irish piper

Davy Spillane Davy Spillane (born 1959 in Dublin, Ireland) is an Irish musician, songwriter and a player of uilleann pipes and low whistle. Biography Irish music At the age of 12, Spillane started playing the uilleann pipes. His father encouraged him an ...

and

Michael Kamen Michael Arnold Kamen (April 15, 1948 – November 18, 2003) was an American composer (especially of film scores), orchestral arranger, orchestral conductor, songwriter, and session musician. Biography Early life Michael Arnold Kamen was born in ...

who wrote orchestrations for many of the songs and brought students from the

Juilliard School The Juilliard School ( ) is a private performing arts conservatory in New York City. Established in 1905, the school trains about 850 undergraduate and graduate students in dance, drama, and music. It is widely regarded as one of the most el ...

to play them. Three new songs were included; "Back To You", "When You Love Someone", and "A Little Love". The song "If Ya Wanna Be Bad - Ya Gotta Be Good" makes its debut on an album, originally appearing on the B-side of "

Let's Make a Night to Remember "Let's Make a Night to Remember" is a song written by Canadian rock artist Bryan Adams, and Robert John "Mutt" Lange. It was recorded by Adams and released on August 12, 1996, as the second single from his seventh studio album, '' 18 til I Die'' ...

" - to which it is paired on the ''Unplugged'' album. Absent from both the CD and DVD is "Hey Elvis", which is available on the single of "Back To You". A second single was released in early 1998, an acoustic reworking of the hard rock song, " I'm Ready". The album included only thirteen of the songs recorded at the show. The ''MTV Unplugged'' DVD included a few different songs and the song order is also different from on the CD. The record sold over 2,500,000 units worldwide.

CD track listing

Personnel

Credits adapted from the album's liner notes. Musicians *

– lead vocals, guitar,

dobro Dobro is an American brand of resonator guitars, currently owned by Gibson and manufactured by its subsidiary Epiphone. The term "dobro" is also used as a generic term for any wood-bodied, single-cone resonator guitar. The Dobro was originally ...

harmonica The harmonica, also known as a French harp or mouth organ, is a free reed wind instrument used worldwide in many musical genres, notably in blues, American folk music, classical music, jazz, country, and rock. The many types of harmonica inclu ...

Patrick Leonard Patrick Ray Leonard (born March 14, 1956) is an American songwriter, keyboardist, film composer, and music producer, best known for his longtime collaboration with Madonna. His work with Madonna includes her albums '' True Blue'' (1986), ''Who's ...

– acoustic piano,

organ Organ may refer to: Biology * Organ (biology), a part of an organism Musical instruments * Organ (music), a family of keyboard musical instruments characterized by sustained tone ** Electronic organ, an electronic keyboard instrument ** Hammond ...

Tommy Mandel Tommy Mandel (born June 2, 1949) is a keyboardist most notable for playing with Bryan Adams from 1981 to 1998, starting with the album ''You Want It You Got It''. Life and career Prior to joining Bryan Adams' band, Mandel released a self-titled ...

– acoustic piano, organ,

accordion Accordions (from 19th-century German ''Akkordeon'', from ''Akkord''—"musical chord, concord of sounds") are a family of box-shaped musical instruments of the bellows-driven free-reed aerophone type (producing sound as air flows past a reed ...

* Keith Scott – guitar,

mandolin A mandolin ( it, mandolino ; literally "small mandola") is a stringed musical instrument in the lute family and is generally plucked with a pick. It most commonly has four courses of doubled strings tuned in unison, thus giving a total of 8 ...

, dobro,

slide guitar Slide guitar is a technique for playing the guitar that is often used in blues music. It involves playing a guitar while holding a hard object (a slide) against the strings, creating the opportunity for glissando effects and deep vibratos tha ...

, harmony vocals * Dave Taylor – bass, harmony vocals *

Mickey Curry Michael Timothy Curry (born June 10, 1956) is an American musician. He has collaborated with singer-songwriter Bryan Adams since the early 1980s, but has also worked with Hall & Oates, Cher, Tina Turner, Alice Cooper, David Bowie, Elvis Costello, ...

– drums, harmony vocals * Danny Cummings – percussion, harmony vocals *

–

Uilleann pipes The uilleann pipes ( or , ) are the characteristic national bagpipe of Ireland. Earlier known in English as "union pipes", their current name is a partial translation of the Irish language terms (literally, "pipes of the elbow"), from their ...

low whistle The low whistle, or concert whistle, is a variation of the traditional tin whistle/pennywhistle, distinguished by its lower pitch and larger size. It is most closely associated with the performances of British and Irish artists such as Tommy Make ...

s Strings *

– arrangements and conductor * Tom Nazelli, Douglas Quint and Scott Starrett – additional arrangements * Jesse Levy – coordinator * Students of the

Juilliard School of Music The Juilliard School ( ) is a private performing arts conservatory in New York City. Established in 1905, the school trains about 850 undergraduate and graduate students in dance, drama, and music. It is widely regarded as one of the most elit ...

: ** Darrett Adkins, Maria Ahn, Raphael Bell and Nina Lee – cello ** Pete Donovan – double bass ** Ed Malave, Tania Halko and Alejandra Mahave – viola ** Angella Ahn, Cornelius Dufallo, Ani Gregorian, Ara Gregorian, Lyris Hung, Amy Kauffman, Jennifer Newell and James Tsao – violin

Production

* Bryan Adams – producer, arrangements * Patrick Leonard – producer, arrangements *

Bob Clearmountain Bob Clearmountain (born January 15, 1953) is an American recording engineer, mixer and record producer. He has worked with many major acts, including Bruce Springsteen, the Rolling Stones, Toto, Bon Jovi and Bryan Adams, with whom he has a very ...

– engineer, mixing * Dave Hewitt – engineer * Phil Gitomer – assistant engineer * Dean Maher – mix assistant * Chris Potter – mix assistant *

Olle Romo Olle Romö is a Swedish music producer, songwriter, and drummer. Romo rehearsed with Swedish progressive rock group Kaipa in early 1982, however he left the group after a few weeks to join Eurythmics, and he was a drummer for them from the mid-to ...

– mix assistant *

Phil Western Phillip Charles Western (August 12, 1971 – February 4, 2019) was a Canadian musician, based in Vancouver and a founding member of the bands Download, PlatEAU, Frozen Rabbit, and Off and Gone. Biography Having started his career as a drumm ...

– mix assistant * Glen Collette – monitor mixing * Joey Perpick – live sound mix engineer * Ron Vermeulen – technical assistant *

Bob Ludwig Robert C. Ludwig (born c. 1945) is an American mastering engineer. He has mastered recordings on all the major recording formats for all the major record labels, and on projects by more than 1,300 artists including Led Zeppelin, Lou Reed, Qu ...

– mastering at Gateway Mastering (Portland, Maine) * Val Dauksts – production manager * Don "Toe" Prodaehl – tour manager * Tom O'Quinn – art direction, design * Glen Ross – art direction, design * Sandy Brummels – art direction, design *

Danny Clinch Danny Clinch (born 1964) is an American photographer and film director. Biography Born in Toms River, New Jersey, Clinch graduated from Toms River High School East in 1982. After attending Ocean County College, he attended the New England Scho ...

– photography * Bruce Allen – management * Chris Chappel – tour management Technicians * Dennis Fitzmartin (keyboards) * Lance Stadnyk (Bryan Adams' guitars) * Rick Salazar (Keith Scott's guitars) * Lorne Wheaton (drums) MTV Credits * Milton Lage – director *

Alex Coletti Alex Coletti is an executive producer and director, formerly for MTV Networks and is now as head of Alex Coletti Productions. A Brooklyn native and graduate of Brooklyn College, he produced MTV's iconic Unplugged series, was a five-time producer ...

– producer * Jac Benson – co-producer

Charts

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

Certifications

Album

DVD

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Unplugged (Adams, Bryan album) 1997 live albums 1997 video albums Live video albums Bryan Adams albums MTV Unplugged albums Albums produced by Patrick Leonard Albums recorded at the Hammerstein Ballroom