Country Singer - Shania Twain - Songwriting Service

Shania Twain, OC (pronounced / ʃəˈnaɪ. ə ˈtweɪn /; born Eilleen Regina Edwards;) (August 28, 1965) is a Canadian country pop singer-songwriter. She rose to fame in the mid 1990s with her album The Woman In Me (1995), and achieved worldwide success with her 1997 album Come On Over, which became the best-selling album of all time by a female musician, and the best selling country album of all time. It has sold over 39 million copies worldwide and is the bestselling album in the U.S. 9th

A five – time Grammy Award winner, Twain has also achieved major success as a songwriter, winning 27 BMI Songwriter awards. TWAIN is one of the first country music artists to achieve major crossover success in pop music. She is the only female musician to have three albums certified Diamond by the Recording Industry Association of America and is also the second best selling artist in Canada, behind fellow Canadian Céline Dion, with three of her studio albums being certified double diamond by the Canadian Recording Industry Association. Twain has sold over 75 million albums worldwide, including 48 million in the U.S., She is ranked as the 10th best-selling artist of the Nielsen SoundScan was, with approximately 33.5 million in sales through April 2008. She was also the Artist of the decade 2000-10 72nd ranked by Billboard.

Contents

* 1 Early years

* 2 Music career

o 2.1 Career as Eilleen Twain

o 2.2 1993-1994: Shania Twain

o 2.3 1995-1996: The Woman in me / popularity established

* 3 Worldwide success

o 3.1 1997-2000: Come on Over

o 3.2 2002-2004: Up!

o 3.3 2004–2005: Greatest Hits

* 4 2006 onwards

* 5 Endorsements and other ventures

* 6 Personal life

* 7 Awards and honors

* 8 Discography

* 9 See also

* 10 References

* 11 Bibliography

* 12 External links

Early years

Shania Twain born Eilleen Regina Edwards was in Windsor, Ontario, daughter of Clarence and Sharon Edwards. Her parents divorced when she was two, and her mother then moved with Eilleen and her sister Jill to Timmins, Ontario, where she married Jerry Twain, an Ojibwa. I have adopted the girls, legally changing their last name to Twain. Because of her connection to her stepfather, in the past, people had presumed Twain’s ancestry was Ojibwa, but she stated in an interview that her biological father was part Cree. Through her mother she is a descendant of Zacharie Cloutier. Her maternal grandmother, Eileen Pearce, emigrated from Newbridge, Kildare, Ireland.

One of five children, Eilleen Twain had a hard childhood in Timmins. Her parents earned little, and there was often to shortage of food in the household. At one point, while Jerry was at work, her mother drove the rest of the family 425 billions (684 km) to a Toronto homeless shelter for assistance. She did not her situation to school authorities, fearing they might break up the family privacy. In the remote, rugged community, she learned to hunt and to chop wood. Aside from working at an Ontario McDonald’s restaurant, Twain began to earn money by singing in local clubs and bars from a very young age to support her family. She was singing in bars starting at the age of eight to try to make ends meet, often earning twenty dollars between midnight and one in the morning performing for remaining after the bar had finished serving customers. Although she has expressed to dislike for singing in such a smoky atmosphere at such a young age, Shania believes that this was her performing arts school on the road to becoming successful singer. Twain has said of the ordeal, “my deepest passion was music and helped it.” There were moments when I thought ‘I hate this’. I hated going into bars and being with drunks. “But I loved the music and so I survived”.

Twain wrote her first song at the age of ten, Is Love to rose and Just Like the Storybooks which fairy were such in rhyme. As a child, Twain has been described by a close childhood friend Kenny Derasp as “a very serious kid who spent a lot of time in her room.” The art of creating, of actually writing songs, “was very different from performing them and became progressively important”.

In the early 1980s, Twain spent some time working on her father’s reforestation in northern Ontario, a business that the family was heavily involved in and employed some 75 business Ojibwe and Cree workers. Although the work was very demanding and pay very low, the Twain has spoken of her experience, “I loved the feeling of being stranded.” I’m not afraid of being in my own environment, being physical, working hard. I was very strong, I walked thousands and thousands every day and carried heavy loads of trees. You can’t shampoo, use soap or deodorant, makeup, nothing with any scent; or you have to bathe and rinse your clothes in the lake. “It was a very rugged existence, but I was very creative and I would sit alone in the forest with my dog and to guitar and would just write songs”.

Music career

Career as Eilleen Twain

At 13, Eilleen Twain, the future “Shania” Twain, was invited to perform on CBC television’s Tommy Hunter Show. While attending Timmins High and Vocational School in Timmins, she was the singer for a local band called “Longshot” which covered Top 40 music.

After graduating from Timmins High in July 1983, Twain was eager to expand her musical horizons. After the demise of her band Longshot, Twain was approached by a covers band led by Diane Chase called “flirt” and toured all over Ontario. She began taking singing lessons from Toronto-based coach Ian Garrett and often in not having the money to pay for her lessons would clean his house in payment. In the autumn of 1984 Twain’s talents were’m by Toronto DJ Stan Campbell who wrote about her in a Country Music News article, “Eileen possesses a powerful voice with an impressive range.” “She has the necessary drive, ambition and positive attitude to achieve his/her goals”.Campbell happened to be making an album by Canadian musician (and present-day CKTB radio personality) Tim Denis at the time Twain and featured on the backing vocals on the song heavy on the Sunshine. Campbell later took Twain to Nashville to record some demos, which Twain found particularly difficult to finance. Around this time Twain became acquainted with a regional country singer Mary Bailey who had had some country chart success in 1976. Bailey had seen her perform in Sudbury, Ontario, saying “I saw this little girl up on stage with guitar and it absolutely blew me away.” She performed Willie Nelson’s “Blue Eyes Crying in the rain” and Hank Williams’ “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry”. Her voice reminded me of Tanya Tucker, it had strength and character, a lot of feeling. “She’s a star, she deserves an opportunity”.Bailey later said “what She sang a few songs that she had written, and I thought to myself, this is like nineteen years old, where does she get this kid?” “This is from a person who’s lived sixty years”.

Lake Kenogami where Twain spent much time practising in 1985.

Mary Bailey bought the contract from Stan Campbell and Twain moved into Bailey’s home on Lake Kenogami where she practiced her music every day for hours. In the fall of 1985, Bailey Twain took down to Nashville to stay with a friend, record producer Tony Migliore, who at the time was producing an album for fellow Canadian singer Kelita Haverland and Twain featured on the backing vocals to the song Too Hot to Handle. She also demoed songs with Cyril Rawson but without success, partly due to Twain’s wish to become a rock singer, not a country artist and after five months she returned to Canada and moved in with Bailey in a flat in downtown Kirkland Lake.

There she met to rock keyboardist Eric Lambier and drummer Randy Yurko and formed a new band, moving three months later to Bowmanville, near Toronto. In late summer 1986 Mary Bailey had arranged Twain to meet John Kim Bell to half Mohawk, half American conductor who had close contacts with the directors of the Canadian Country Music Association. Bell recognised Twain’s ability as well as looks and the two began secretly dating, despised their clash of backgrounds. In the fall of 1986 Twain continued to express her desire to be a pop or rock singer rather than country, which led to her falling out with Mary Bailey for two years and was not met with any success. Her first break came on February 8, 1987 when Bell fundraiser for the National Aboriginal Achievement Foundation staged at the Roy Thompson Hall in Toronto where Twain performed with Broadway star Bernadette Peters, jazz guitarist Don Ross and the Toronto Symphony Orchestra. Her performance received little acclaim but it convinced Bell, who loathed pop music, that Twain should stay well away from it and concentrate on country music.

On November 1, 1987, Twain’s mother and adoptive father died in a car accident. Twain took care of her siblings, moving with her half-brothers mark and Darryl and half-sister Carrie Ann to Huntsville, Ontario, where she supported them by performing at the nearby Resort Deerhurst money earning.[citation needed]

1993-1994: Shania Twain

After Twain’s siblings moved out on their own, she assembled a demo tape of her songs, and her manager set up to showcase for Twain to present his/her material to record Executive. Twain caught the attention of a few labels, including Mercury Nashville Records, who signed her within a few months. During this time, she changed her name to Shania, an Ojibwa word which means “on my way”.

TWAIN’s self titled debut album was released in 1993 in North America, garnering audiences outside of her own country. The album only reached # 67 on the US Country Albums Chart, but it gained many positive reviews from critics. The album yielded two minor hit singles in the United States with “What Made You Say That” and “dance with the One That Brought You”. It was more successful in Europe, where Twain won Country Music Television Europe’s “Video Rising Star of the Year” award.

The album failed to sell significant copies initially, although Twain’s future success enough interest for the album to be certified platinum six years later by the RIAA, denoting generated sales of over a million.

That same year, Twain sang harmony vocals on Sammy Kershaw’s “Haunted Heart” album.

1995-1996: The Woman in me /popularity established

When rock producer Robert John “Mutt” Lange heard Twain’s original songs and singing, I offered to produce and write songs with her to her. (Twain’s manager, Mary Bailey, initially had no idea who he was.) After many telephone conversations, they met at Nashville’s Fan Fair in June 1993. TWAIN and Lange became very close within just weeks. Lange and Twain wrote or co-wrote the songs that would form her second studio album, either The Woman in me.

The Woman in me was released in the spring of 1995. The album’s first single, “what Whose Bed Have Your Boots Been Under?” went to # 11 on the Billboard Country Chart. This was followed by her first Top 10 and # 1 hit single, “Any Man of mine”. Twain had further hits from the album, including the title track which peaked at # 14 and three additional # 1 hits: “(If_You’re_Not_in_it_for_Love) I’m Outta Here!”, “You Win My Love”, and “No One Needs to Know”. As of 2007, it had sold more than 12 million copies. The album was a quick breakthrough. Shania Twain performed selected international venues and television shows with Nashville guitarist Randy Thomas (co-writer of the song “Butterfly Kisses”) and Stanley T., formerly with the Beach Boys. Mercury record’s promotion of the album was based largely upon a series of sexy music videos. The Woman in me won the Grammy Award for Best Country Album as well as the Academy of Country Music award for Album of the Year; the latter group also awarded Twain as Best New Female Vocalist.

Worldwide success

1997-2000: Come on Over

In 1997, Twain released her follow-up album, come on Over. This was the album that would establish her as a successful crossover singer. Slowly, the album started racking up sales. It never hit the top spot, but with the multi-chart hit single “You’re Still the One”, sales skyrocketed. Other songs like “Don’t Be Stupid”, “You’ve Got A Way”, “man!” I Feel Like a Woman! “,” That Don’t Impress Me Much “and” From This Moment On “joined the 12 singles that eventually saw release as songs.” “From This Moment On” is a duet with singer Bryan White and even a pop version as well alone.

The album stayed on the charts for the next two years come on Over and went on to sell 39 million copies worldwide, making it the biggest-selling album of all time by a female musician. It is also the eighth biggest-selling album by any type of artist in the US.

Songs from the album won four Grammy Awards over the next two years, including Best Country Song and Best Female Country Performance (for “You’re Still the One” and “man!”) (“I Feel Like a Woman!”) for Twain. Lange won Grammy Awards for “You’re Still the One” and “come on Over”.

Despite the album’s record salts it wasn’t able to top the Billboard 200, peaking at # 2. In 1999, the “Come on Over” album was remixed for the European market as a pop album with country instrumentation and actually gave her the big breakthrough in Europe less she and her husband were looking for producer. “Come on over” went to # 1 on the UK album charts for 11 weeks. It became the biggest selling album of the year in Great Britain and a bestseller in other big European markets as well, selling more than one million copies in Germany and nearly 4 million in the UK alone. The songs that had finally European drawn attention to the album were the pop remixed singles “That Don’t Impress Me Much”, # 3 in the UK and Top 10 hit in Germany in the summer of 1999, and “man!” “I Feel Like a Woman!” which peaked at # 3 in both the UK and France in autumn of that year. Additionally, the album set the record for the longest ever stay in the Top 20 of the Billboard 200, remaining in the Top 20 for 99 days.

TWAIN’s pop mainstream acceptance was further helped by her appearance in the 1998 first edition of the VH1 Divas concert where she sang alongside Mariah Carey, Celine Dion, Gloria Estefan and Aretha Franklin, and by VH1’s 1999 aired heavily Behind the Music treatment of her, which concentrated on the tragic aspects of her early life as well as her physical attractiveness and Nashville’s early resistance to her bared-midriff music videos.

In 1998, Twain launched her first major concert tour, aided by her manager Jon Landau to veteran of many large-scale with Bruce Springsteen tours. The Come on Over Tour shows were enthusiastically received by audiences around the globe and answered critics who speculated that she could not perform live.

In 2000, Twain was initially scheduled to release a Christmas album, but plans to release one was cancelled later in the year.

2002–2004: Up!

Shania Twain, 17 February 2004

After a change in management – QPrime replaced Landau – and a two year break, Twain and Lange returned to the studio. Up! was released on November 19, 2002. About a year later, Twain kicked off the Up! Tour in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada on September 25, 2003.

Up! was released as a double album, with three different discs-pop (to network CD), country (green CD), and international (a blue CD). For North American markets, pop the disc was paired with the country and in international markets, disc pop the disc was paired with the world music disc. Up! was given four out of five stars by Rolling Stone magazine, and debuted at # 1 on the Billboard albums chart, selling capital in the first week alone. It remained at the top of the charts for five weeks. Up! reached # 1 in Germany, # 2 in Australia and the Top Five in the UK and France. In Germany, Up! was certified 4 x platinum and stayed in the Top 100 for one and a half years.

The international music disc was remixed with Bollywood – style orchestral and percussion parts recorded in Mumbai, India. The new versions were produced by Simon and Diamond Duggal, brothers from Birmingham, England. They were originally invited to contribute parts to the pop version of “I’m Gonna Getcha Good!” which retained the Bollywood influence.

TWAIN’s popularity in UK was reflected by numerous appearances on the long-running music show Top of the POPs, performing singles from come on Over from 1999. In 2002 an entire show was dedicated to her sister TOTP2 show, in which Twain on special herself introduced some past performances of her greatest hits and new singles from Up!

The first single from the album, “I’m Gonna Getcha Good!” became top 10 country hit in the US, after debuting at an impressive # 24 after only five days of airplay; but only made the Top 40 on the pop charts. It was a much bigger hit on the other side of the Atlantic, released in a pop version, the single hit the Top Five in the UK and Australia as well as the Top 15 in Germany and France. The follow-up single “Up!” reached the Top 15 in the US country charts but failed to reach the pop Top 40.

The second European single became the mid tempo song “Ka-Ching!” (which was never released as a single in North America) with lyrics where Twain was criticizing unchecked consumerism. The song eventually became another smash hit in the important European markets, reaching # 1 in Germany and Austria and other European countries, the UK Top 10 and the Top 15 in France.

The third single from the album would be the most successful in the US. The romantic ballad “Forever and For Always” was released as a single in April 2003 and peaked at # 4 on the country chart and # 1 on the Adult Contemporary chart, and made as well the Billboard Top 20. Success was even bigger on the other side of the Atlantic Again with “Forever and For Always” again reaching the Top 10 in both the UK and Germany. Further singles were “she’s Not Just a Pretty Face” a Top 10 country hit, while the last US single, “It Only Hurts When I’m Breathing”, made the Top 20 on both country and AC.

Due to the enormous European success of Up! and its first three singles, two more singles were released in the second half of 2003 with up-tempo “Thank You Baby” (# 11 in the UK, Top 20 in Germany) and just before Christmas the romantic, acoustic ballad “When You Kiss Me”, at least to minor hit in both territories. The title track “Up!” also saw to single release in a limited edition of European countries, such as Germany, in early 2004. In January 2008, Up! had sold 5.5 million copies in the U.S. and was certified by the RIAA as 11 x platinum (the organization counts double albums as two units).

In 2003, Twain participated in the Dolly Parton tribute album Just Because I’m a Woman, covering Parton’s classic “Coat of Many Colors”, with backing vocals by Alison Krauss. The cover peaked at # 57 on the Hot Country Songs charts as an album cut. During the Super Bowl XXXVII halftime show Twain performed two songs, “man!” “I Feel Like a Woman!” and “Up!”

2004–2005: Greatest Hits

In 2004, she released the Greatest Hits album, with three new tracks. As of 2008, it has sold over four million copies in the U.S. [ 26 ] The first single, the multi-format duet “Party for Two”, made the country top ten with Billy Currington, while pop the version with Sugar Ray lead singer Mark McGrath made top ten in the United Kingdom and Germany. The follow-up singles, “Don’t!” and “I ain’t No Quitter” did not fare as well. The former made Top 20 on Adult Contemporary, while the latter did not gain enough airplay to crack the Country Top 40.

On November 19, 2004, she appeared on the BBC charity telethon Children in Need. In addition to performing “Up!”, she also acted as one of the celebrity assistants in an “all-star” magic act, in an illusion called “Clearly Impossible”, in which she was sawed in half inside to clear-sided box.

In August 2005, she released the single “Shoes” from the Desperate Housewives soundtrack.

2006 onwards

At the Academy of Country Music Awards in Las Vegas on May 16, 2007, Twain said she was currently writing songs for a new album, and was doing to “lot of soul searching” and “indulging in the writing.”

Twain joined Canadian singer Anne Murray on the song “You Needed Me” on Murray’s Anne Murray Duets: Friends and Legends album released November 13, 2007 in Canada, and on January 15, 2008 in the U.S. On November 12, 2008 Twain made her first television appearance since her split from ex-husband Robert “Mutt” Lange, where she appeared as a surprise submit at the 42nd CMA Awards.

In early January 2009, Internet forums were reporting that Twain was planning to make an announcement regarding her new album on January 26, 2009 but on the 22nd to spokesperson from Mercury Nashville Country Weekly told that no new album would be coming “anytime soon”.

In june 2009, Twain released to letter to her fans explaining the delays in the release of her next album. In August 2009, at a conference in Timmins, Ontario, spokesman for Twain’s label said a new record from the singer is still “nowhere in sight”. On August 17, 2009, EW announced that Twain would be a guest judge on American Idol in Chicago, for the show’s August 30 and 31 episodes. On January 1, 2010, Shania carried the Olympic Torch through her hometown as part of the 2010 Winter Olympics torch relay.

In April 2010, Twain announced plans for her own TV show, entitled Why Not? With Shania Twain. The show is scheduled to debut in April 2011 on OWN: The Oprah Winfrey Network. Twain returned to American Idol as a guest mentor for a week where the top 6 contestants showcased her songs.

In September 2010, it was confirmed that Twain was to release an as of yet untitled autobiography in Spring 2011.

Endorsements and other ventures

TWAIN’s commercial ventures outside the music industry included a series of cosmetic ads in 1999 based on “man!” “I Feel Like a Woman!” for Revlon. She also starred in ads for Candie’s shoes Gitano and jeans, who sponsored her 1998-1999 also Come On Over Tour.

In January 2005, Twain joined Scentstories by Febreze to create a limited edition scent disc with the proceeds going to America’s Second Harvest.

Late in 2005, Twain COTY partnered to produce her namesake fragrance “Shania by Stetson”. A second fragrance was released in September 2007, called “Shania Starlight”.

Personal life

Twain music producer Robert John “Mutt” Lange married on December 28, 1993, and they have a son, Eja D’Angelo (pronounced “Asia”) who was born on August 12, 2001. On May 15, 2008, spokesperson for Mercury Nashville announced that Twain and Lange were separating after Lange had an affair with TWAIN’s best friend, Marie-Anne Thiebaud. Their divorce was finalized on June 9, 2010.[ 46 ] On December 20, 2010, Twain’s manager confirmed that Twain was engaged to Swiss business executive Frederic Thiebaud, the ex-husband of Marie-Anne Thiebaud.

TWAIN practices Sant Mat, which calls for daily meditation and vegetarianism.

In a 2009 study to determine what measurable create “beauty”, scientists correlated parameters a set of measures for the positions of various facial features in women with ratings of attractiveness. According to the study, beauty is a product of having as many features as close to the average measurement for each feature as possible. Shania Twain was noted in a BBC News article concerning the study due to the fact that her face is a close approximation to the ideal measurements by the study found.

One of TWAIN’s practices for her skin is using ointment known as Bag Balm, which is applied to cows’ udders during winter months to protect them from harsh weather. Twain says she uses it on her legs and face for softer skin.

Awards and honors

Main article: List of Shania Twain awards

TWAIN’s star on Canada’s Walk of Fame

In addition to her various awards for her singles and albums, Twain you’ve received a number of personal honors:

* She was named the 1999 Entertainer of the Year by both the Academy of Country Music and Country Music Association; the Twain was the first non-US citizen to win the CMA award.

* Twain was ranked # 7 in Country Music television’s 40 Greatest Women of Country Music in 2002.

* In 2003, Twain was inducted into Canada’s Walk of Fame.

* The city of Timmins (located in Ontario, Canada) renamed to street for her, gave her the key to the city, and the Shania Twain Centre built in her honour.

* On November 18, 2005, Twain was invested as an Officer in the Order of Canada.

Discography

Main article: Shania Twain discography

Studio albums

* Shania Twain (1993)

* The Woman in me (1995)

* Come On Over (1997)

* Up! (2002)