Renaissance

esteban · Post by **esteban** » Sat Feb 11, 2006 7:04 pm

Recently, after having TIS in heavy rotation, I was driven to dig up some older Renaissance LPs (yep! Vinyl!) and have a listen to Annie Haslem again.

There are moments on "Through a Glass Darkly" in particular that seem to be inspired by early 70's Renaissance, such as "Ashes are Burning". It may be circumstantial (the very symphonic, lovely melodies and lush harmonies, the interplay between the male and female voices) but there it is. It's not like these guys haven't evoked the ghosts of 70's prog bands before - which is very

Post by **MayorOfLongview** » Sun Feb 12, 2006 1:10 am

BTW, Annie Haslam has offered to sing with us should we ever need her!

Alatar · Post by **Alatar** » Sun Feb 12, 2006 7:35 am

Wow, you guys have a knack of attracting great female singers! I'm not a huge Renaissance fan (I don't mind them), but Annie Haslam has a great voice.

esteban · Post by **esteban** » Sun Feb 12, 2006 12:36 pm

MayorOfLongview wrote:BTW, Annie Haslam has offered to sing with us should we ever need her!

Well right now you don't need her, you have Susie. What's more, she's in her prime - her turn in the spotlight at Belmont was ample evidence of that. As Alatar says, GH does attract great female talent - I've enjoyed listening to all of them.

That said, it would be fun to hear Annie Haslam do a guest turn on a GH album or event, like Lucassen did on Chronometree.

That haunting soprano line that opens "Walking Toward Doom" should remind her some of "Mother Russia".

Elric · Post by **Elric** » Sun Feb 12, 2006 5:14 pm

Wow,

I love her version of Turn of the Century. There is a Yes tribute album called Tales of Yesterday where Steve Howe does the backing acoustic....

I almost like her version of it better than Jon Anderson's.

I love Annie's live Brazil album. Although the acoustics do not do her much justice, she gives a good feel and energy to the concert that makes me wish I was there.

otteaux · Post by **otteaux** » Thu Mar 09, 2006 4:08 pm

Anne has a nice voice, but Susie has got her beat, IMHO. The only other vocalist I've heard with as beautiful a singing voice as Susie is Harriet Wheeler who used to sing for The Sundays.

Hopefully GH will come down to DC one of these days so I can enjoy them live!

yeshead 777 · Post by **yeshead 777** » Thu Mar 09, 2006 9:21 pm

I agree with Esteban-I think Susie has unlimited potential-and her brief time in the spotlight at Belmont more than proved it! I personally hope she has more to do on the next CD. She's a keeper!

EIwing · Post by **EIwing** » Fri Mar 10, 2006 12:32 pm

Susie doesn't get to the forum very often, so I took the liberty of calling her and telling her what all of you said.

She said she was touched! Just thought I'd let you all know.

esteban · Post by **esteban** » Wed Mar 15, 2006 2:43 pm

Thanks for that. And don't think we don't appreciate
your own work in the band!

The vocal harmonies drew me to Glass Hammer early on, especially
the great use of the female vocalists. I'm a big fan of tight
ensemble and choral singing, used to do it myself, (Bach motets,
anyone?) so songs like "Chronos Deliverer" resonated with me early on.

"Run Lisette" is my favorite from Shadowlands. Very cool polyphony,
I can imagine how hard all that is to pull off live. Nice job!

EIwing · Post by **EIwing** » Wed Mar 15, 2006 11:18 pm

Heh, thanks. All the credit goes to the guys for writing such great tunes.