''Shepherd Moons'' is the third studio album by
Irish
Irish may refer to:
Common meanings
* Someone or something of, from, or related to:
** Ireland, an island situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe
***Éire, Irish language name for the isle
** Northern Ireland, a constituent unit ...
singer, songwriter and musician
Enya
Enya Patricia Brennan (; ga, Eithne Pádraigín Ní Bhraonáin; born 17 May 1961), known professionally by the mononym Enya, is an Irish singer, songwriter, and musician known for modern Celtic music. She is the best-selling Irish solo arti ...
, released on 4 November 1991 by
WEA
The Wea were a Miami-Illinois-speaking Native American tribe originally located in western Indiana. Historically, they were described as either being closely related to the Miami Tribe or a sub-tribe of Miami.
Today, the descendants of the ...
. After the unexpected critical and commercial success of her previous album ''
Watermark
A watermark is an identifying image or pattern in paper that appears as various shades of lightness/darkness when viewed by transmitted light (or when viewed by reflected light, atop a dark background), caused by thickness or density variations ...
'' (1988), Enya embarked on a worldwide promotional tour to support it. At its conclusion, she wrote and rehearsed new material for her next album with her long time recording partners, manager, arranger and producer
Nicky Ryan
Nicholas Dominick Ryan (born 14 July 1946) is an Irish music producer, recording engineer, and manager. He is best known as the longtime business and recording partner for the singer, songwriter and musician Enya alongside his wife, poet and lyri ...
and his wife, lyricist
Roma Ryan
Roma Shane Ryan (born 20 January 1954 in Belfast) is an Irish writer, poet, and lyricist, currently living in Killiney, Ireland, with her husband Nicky Ryan. Ryan is the primary lyricist for the singer Enya, who has stated that the importance of ...
. The album was recorded in Ireland and London and continued to display Enya's sound of multi-tracked vocals with keyboards and elements of
Celtic
Celtic, Celtics or Keltic may refer to:
Language and ethnicity
*pertaining to Celts, a collection of Indo-European peoples in Europe and Anatolia
**Celts (modern)
*Celtic languages
**Proto-Celtic language
* Celtic music
*Celtic nations
Sports Fo ...
and
new-age
New Age is a range of spiritual or religious practices and beliefs which rapidly grew in Western society during the early 1970s. Its highly eclectic and unsystematic structure makes a precise definition difficult. Although many scholars conside ...
music.
''Shepherd Moons'' received generally positive reviews from critics and became a greater commercial success than ''Watermark''. It went to number one on the
UK Albums Chart
The Official Albums Chart is a list of albums ranked by physical and digital sales and (from March 2015) audio streaming in the United Kingdom. It was published for the first time on 22 July 1956 and is compiled every week by the Official Charts C ...
and peaked at number seventeen on the
''Billboard'' 200 in the United States. The album was certified multi-platinum by the
British Phonographic Industry
British Phonographic Industry (BPI) is the British recorded music industry's Trade association. It runs the BRIT Awards, the Classic BRIT Awards, National Album Day, is home to the Mercury Prize, and co-owns the Official Charts Company with th ...
and
Recording Industry Association of America
The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is a trade organization that represents the music recording industry in the United States. Its members consist of record labels and distributors that the RIAA says "create, manufacture, and/o ...
for shipments of 1.2 million and five million copies, respectively. Between 1991 and 1994, Enya released four singles from ''Shepherd Moons'': "
Caribbean Blue
"Caribbean Blue" is a song by Irish musician Enya, included as the second track on her third studio album, ''Shepherd Moons'' (1991). It follows a waltz time signature, and mentions the Anemoi (Ancient Greek wind gods): Boreas, Afer Ventus (Af ...
", "
How Can I Keep from Singing?
"How Can I Keep From Singing?" (also known by its first line "My Life Flows On in Endless Song") is an American folksong originating as a Christian hymn. The author of the lyrics was known only as 'Pauline T', and the original tune was composed ...
", "
Book of Days", which charted at number ten in the United Kingdom, and "
Marble Halls". As with ''Watermark'', Enya supported the album with a worldwide promotional tour that included several interviews and televised performances. In 1993, the album won Enya a
Grammy Award
The Grammy Awards (stylized as GRAMMY), or simply known as the Grammys, are awards presented by the Recording Academy of the United States to recognize "outstanding" achievements in the music industry. They are regarded by many as the most pres ...
for
Best New Age Album
The Grammy Award for Best New Age Album is presented to recording artists for quality albums in the new-age music genre at the Grammy Awards, a ceremony that was established in 1958 and originally called the Gramophone Awards. Honors in several c ...
, the first of four she has won in her career. It was reissued in 1992 and 2009; the latter was a Japanese release with bonus tracks.
Background and writing
In September 1988, Enya released her second studio album ''
Watermark
A watermark is an identifying image or pattern in paper that appears as various shades of lightness/darkness when viewed by transmitted light (or when viewed by reflected light, atop a dark background), caused by thickness or density variations ...
''. It became an unexpected commercial success, charting around the world helped by its international top-ten hit, "
Orinoco Flow
"Orinoco Flow", also released as "Orinoco Flow (Sail Away)", is a song by Irish singer-songwriter Enya from her second studio album, ''Watermark'' (1988). It was released on 3 October 1988 by WEA Records in the United Kingdom and by Geffen Rec ...
". The album propelled Enya to worldwide fame and she spent much of the following year travelling worldwide to promote it through interviews, appearances, and performances.
[ With such a length of time for promotion, Enya felt the priority was to return to the studio and record a new album rather than spend further time planning and completing a concert tour, partly due to the various difficulties involved in recreating her studio-oriented sound in a live setting.] Enya worked with her long time recording partners, manager, producer and arranger Nicky Ryan
Nicholas Dominick Ryan (born 14 July 1946) is an Irish music producer, recording engineer, and manager. He is best known as the longtime business and recording partner for the singer, songwriter and musician Enya alongside his wife, poet and lyri ...
and his wife, lyricist Roma Ryan
Roma Shane Ryan (born 20 January 1954 in Belfast) is an Irish writer, poet, and lyricist, currently living in Killiney, Ireland, with her husband Nicky Ryan. Ryan is the primary lyricist for the singer Enya, who has stated that the importance of ...
.[ The success of ''Watermark'' complicated the writing process at first. Enya recalled: "I put a lot of pressure on myself at the beginning ... When I was composing new melodies I kept thinking "Would this have gone on ''Watermark''? Is it as good?" Eventually I had to forget about this and start on a blank canvas and just really go with what felt right in the studio."][
When the process got underway, she was able to forget about the success of ''Watermark'' and start again. She added, "It felt like ''Watermark'' was a dream. It felt like it hadn't happened. And in a way it's nice because you can concentrate only on the music. You can forget about charts, how much you sold. You forget that."][ As with all her albums, Enya considered a strong melody as a fundamental part to her songwriting.][ Only when she has pieced one together, usually with vocal ideas or with piano accompaniment, does she then build a song around it.][ As with ''Watermark'', Enya sings ]Irish
Irish may refer to:
Common meanings
* Someone or something of, from, or related to:
** Ireland, an island situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe
***Éire, Irish language name for the isle
** Northern Ireland, a constituent unit ...
, her first language, English, and Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
. Her Catholic upbringing and childhood experiences of hymns and church music
Church music is Christian music written for performance in church, or any musical setting of ecclesiastical liturgy, or music set to words expressing propositions of a sacred nature, such as a hymn.
History
Early Christian music
The onl ...
, coupled with later studies in classical music, were big influences that helped form her albums.[ She gained inspiration from several sources and stories, including her personal diaries and her grandparents.][ Two tracks on ''Shepherd Moons'' are traditional songs that Enya rearranged with Nicky.][ Initially, Enya felt worried that by recording non-original songs, she would be unable to perform them with the same amount of emotion as she might with her own compositions, though her strong feelings towards them coupled with their age, made recording them easier.][
]
Recording
''Shepherd Moons'' was recorded with new equipment purchased with the profits from ''Watermark''. Much of the album was recorded at Aigle Studio, the recording studio in the Ryans' home, then located in Artane, a northern suburb of Dublin
Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of th ...
. However, as with her two previous albums, recording and production had to relocate elsewhere as the Aigle facility lacked the correct equipment to complete the final mix and mastering. The album was finished at SARM West Studios
Sarm Studios is an independent recording studio in London. Originally founded in east London in 1973, the studio's original location was renamed Sarm East Studios in 1982 when Jill Sinclair and Trevor Horn purchased Basing Street Studios from Isl ...
in London, where "How Can I Keep from Singing?", "Book of Days", and "Lothlórien" were recorded with additional engineering and mixing carried out by Gregg Jackman. As with ''Watermark'', several musicians were brought in to perform additional instruments. Andy Duncan plays percussion on "Book of Days", Roy Jewitt plays the clarinet on "Evacuee" and "Angeles", Liam O'Flionn plays the 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 ...
on "Smaointe...", Steve Sidwell plays the cornet
The cornet (, ) is a brass instrument similar to the trumpet but distinguished from it by its conical bore, more compact shape, and mellower tone quality. The most common cornet is a transposing instrument in B, though there is also a sopr ...
on "Evacuee", and Nicky performs percussion on "Ebudæ".[
Enya noticed a change in her own attitude when it came to recording ''Shepherd Moons'', "the difference ... is that I've mellowed".] This was down to the greater amount of time Enya took away from the studio, particularly during "quite difficult" moments, while recording the album in comparison to ''Watermark''. The process, she felt, improved her sense of creativity in the long run.[ In some parts on the album, Enya recorded 500 layered voices without sampling or replication. When the melody to a song was completed, Roma Ryan would write lyrics to it.][ Several months after recording and mixing was complete, Enya had not yet listened to the album. "I will find any excuse not to. And honestly, I have never felt so miserable as finishing this album. It's fear – fear that all your feelings and all your emotions have gone into the thing, and when you hear it, it won't live up to your expectations for it."]
Writer Molly Burke wrote about the album's artwork: "''Shepherd Moons'' features Enya in what can only be described as an opera gown she could be twenty or forty but her delicate beauty is intact. There is a sense of timelessness here bathed in the dark but fragile blue of sorrow".[
]
Songs
Side one
As with ''Watermark'', the album title opens with an instrumental title track with wordless vocals. Its title, devised by Roma, refers to two inner satellite
In astronomy, an inner moon or inner natural satellite is a natural satellite following a prograde, low-inclination orbit inwards of the large satellites of the parent planet. They are generally thought to have been formed ''in situ'' at the same ...
moons around Saturn
Saturn is the sixth planet from the Sun and the second-largest in the Solar System, after Jupiter. It is a gas giant with an average radius of about nine and a half times that of Earth. It has only one-eighth the average density of Earth; h ...
discovered in 1980, Pandora
In Greek mythology, Pandora (Greek: , derived from , ''pān'', i.e. "all" and , ''dōron'', i.e. "gift", thus "the all-endowed", "all-gifted" or "all-giving") was the first human woman created by Hephaestus on the instructions of Zeus. As Hes ...
and Prometheus
In Greek mythology, Prometheus (; , , possibly meaning "forethought")Smith"Prometheus". is a Titan god of fire. Prometheus is best known for defying the gods by stealing fire from them and giving it to humanity in the form of technology, know ...
,[ that "protect and preserve the rings very much like a shepherd guiding his flock". Enya also liked the title as the association with the moon "is quite romantic".]
"Caribbean Blue
"Caribbean Blue" is a song by Irish musician Enya, included as the second track on her third studio album, ''Shepherd Moons'' (1991). It follows a waltz time signature, and mentions the Anemoi (Ancient Greek wind gods): Boreas, Afer Ventus (Af ...
" is a waltz that depicts a journey through a fantasy world. It was named by Roma Ryan, as the melody that Enya had come up with reminded her of the Caribbean
The Caribbean (, ) ( es, El Caribe; french: la Caraïbe; ht, Karayib; nl, De Caraïben) is a region of the Americas that consists of the Caribbean Sea, its islands (some surrounded by the Caribbean Sea and some bordering both the Caribbean Se ...
.[ In writing about the song in 2002, Roma wrote: "As with all dreams we reach for the ideal and "Caribbean Blue" represents such a dream. The lyrics can be summed up in three words, Believe in yourself."][
Enya believed "]How Can I Keep from Singing?
"How Can I Keep From Singing?" (also known by its first line "My Life Flows On in Endless Song") is an American folksong originating as a Christian hymn. The author of the lyrics was known only as 'Pauline T', and the original tune was composed ...
" was a traditional Christian hymn from the Shaker sect. She chose to record her own rendition of it as she liked its melody and "very strong" lyrics. She added, "They talked about the trouble in the world, the strife, the turmoil, but at the end of each verse it simply said "how can I keep from singing?" ... I believe this in music ... at some stage you've got to try and forget the trouble that is around you".[
Enya and her record company were sued for copyright infringement by Sanga Music, Inc. for recording the song because she had mistakenly credited this track as a "traditional Shaker hymn", thus assumed it as public domain. ]Pete Seeger
Peter Seeger (May 3, 1919 – January 27, 2014) was an American folk singer and social activist. A fixture on nationwide radio in the 1940s, Seeger also had a string of hit records during the early 1950s as a member of the Weavers, notably ...
had helped make the song fairly well known in the 1950s by publishing it with Doris Plenn's additional third verse in his folk music magazine Sing Out! (Vol. 7, No 1. 1957), recording it, and mistakenly credited it as a "traditional Quaker hymn" without copyrighting Plenn's verse, thus presenting the entire song as "public domain". It was again published by Sanga Music, Inc. in 1964. Seeger had presented the new verse as being public domain and Plenn had only wanted the song to be preserved rather than seeking to make a profit from it, so the court decided that Enya could use the verse without paying royalties.
"Ebudæ" is an ancient name of the Hebrides
The Hebrides (; gd, Innse Gall, ; non, Suðreyjar, "southern isles") are an archipelago off the west coast of the Scottish mainland. The islands fall into two main groups, based on their proximity to the mainland: the Inner and Outer Hebrid ...
islands in western Scotland
Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...
. The word was previously referenced in "Orinoco Flow", specifically in the lyric "From the north to the south, Ebudae into Khartoum
Khartoum or Khartum ( ; ar, الخرطوم, Al-Khurṭūm, din, Kaartuɔ̈m) is the capital of Sudan. With a population of 5,274,321, its metropolitan area is the largest in Sudan. It is located at the confluence of the White Nile, flowing n ...
". The song is composed of wordless mouth sounds
''Mouth Sounds'' is a mashup album by American musician Neil Cicierega. The album was released independently by Cicierega on April 27, 2014. Consisting of mashups pairing Top 40 hits of the 1980s and 1990s along with Smash Mouth's " All Star" ...
that resemble Irish and Scottish Gaelic
Scottish Gaelic ( gd, Gàidhlig ), also known as Scots Gaelic and Gaelic, is a Goidelic language (in the Celtic branch of the Indo-European language family) native to the Gaels of Scotland. As a Goidelic language, Scottish Gaelic, as well as ...
. Its story was inspired by the tradition of Scottish waulking song
Waulking songs ( gd, Òrain Luaidh) are Scottish folk songs, traditionally sung in the Gaelic language by women while fulling (waulking) cloth. This practice involved a group of women, who traditionally prepared cloth, rhythmically beating new ...
s sung by women as they fulled cloth.
"No Holly for Miss Quinn" is a piano instrumental named after a novel by Miss Read
Dora Jessie Saint Order of the British Empire, MBE (17 April 1913 – 7 April 2012),
née Shafe, best known by the pen name Miss Read, was an English novelist and, by profession, a Schoolmaster, schoolmistress. Her pseudonym was derived from her ...
. It follows its partner piece, "Miss Clare Remembers" from ''Watermark'', also named after one of her stories.[
]
Side two
Enya drew inspiration for " Book of Days" from her own personal diary, something which Roma suggested as she knew Enya enjoyed keeping one. The song was adapted from its original form as an instrumental track for the soundtrack to the 1992 romantic film ''Far and Away
''Far and Away'' is a 1992 American epic Western romantic adventure drama film directed by Ron Howard from a screenplay by Bob Dolman and a story by Howard and Dolman. It stars Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman. This was the last cinematography cr ...
'', with Roma writing a set of lyrics based on the film's themes. The song features Irish lyrics that describe the excitement of writing in the diary in the morning, "because you don't really know what's going to happen ... it's the expectation of that day really that she was talking about".
"Evacuee" was written after she and Roma had seen a BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
and her subsequent reunion with her parents. A girl who was crying while recounting the story of her separation from, and return to, her home had moved them greatly. After Enya had written a melody for the song, the two imagined the scenario of the girl saying goodbye at the train station, "waiting until it's all over".