It's a Beautiful Day

It's a Beautiful Day is an American band formed in San Francisco, California, in 1967, featuring vocalist Pattie Santos along with violinist David LaFlamme and his wife, Linda LaFlamme, on keyboards.

David LaFlamme, a former soloist with the Utah Symphony Orchestra, had previously been in the band Orkustra, and unusually, played a five-string violin. The other members of It's a Beautiful Day in its early years were Hal Wagenet (guitar), Mitchell Holman (bass) and Val Fuentes (drums). Although they were one of the earliest and most important San Francisco bands to emerge from 1967's social phenomenon Summer of Love, the band never quite achieved the success of contemporaries such as Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane and Santana, with whom they had connections. The band created a unique blend of rock, jazz, folk, classical and world beat styles during the initial seven years it was officially together.

Early history: 1967–1969

The band's original manager, Matthew Katz, had previously worked with the rock bands Jefferson Airplane and Moby Grape. The members of the band were unaware that the other two bands were already trying to end their business relationships with Katz. During 1967 and early 1968, Katz prevented It's a Beautiful Day from performing in San Francisco, telling them they were not ready. He booked their first public appearances at a club he controlled in Seattle, Washington, formerly known as the Encore Ballroom. Katz renamed the club San Francisco Sound. While in Seattle, the group lived in the attic of an old house owned by Katz while writing and rehearsing new songs in between club performances. Few customers came to the club during the band's engagement in Seattle during December 1967.

It's a Beautiful Day (album)

It's a Beautiful Day is the self-titled debut album by San Francisco psychedelic band It's a Beautiful Day. This album's song "White Bird" was the band's biggest hit. The album rose to #47 on Billboard's Top LPs American albums chart.

The cover

The cover was designed by George Hunter and painted by Kent Hollister based on the cover of a housekeeping magazine from around 1900. The cover used an old version of the Columbia logo that George Hunter felt fit with the feel of the rest of the cover. The album cover is number 24 on Rolling Stone's list of 100 greatest album covers.

A 1972 reissue of the album in The Netherlands on CBS used a modern painting of a beach scene as the front and back cover.

Album content

The group's signature song "White Bird" was inspired by the experiences David and Linda LaFlamme had while living in Seattle, Washington. For a few weeks in December 1967 the group members lived in the attic of an old house while playing and rehearsing at a Seattle venue originally known as The Encore Ballroom. The band's manager Matthew Katz had recently assumed control over the club and renamed it "San Francisco Sound". In an ironic twist on the band's name, the song was partly inspired by Seattle's rainy winter weather. In a later interview David LaFlamme said:

Harem (album)

Harem is the eighth studio album by English singer and songwriter Sarah Brightman, released in the United States on 10 June 2003 through Angel Records. The album continued the collaboration between Brightman and her longtime producer Frank Peterson.

Although it has an inclination towards her signature operatic performance, the album encompasses dance-oriented and uptempo styles in keeping with a celebratory motif. In contrast to the classical crossover music style that framed her previous releases, Harem showcases a wider range of genres, exploring World music-related styles, such as Arabic and Indian music.

Harem received generally positive reviews. The Arabian-flavoured album was commercially well received in certain territories. It became Brightman's first top 10 album ever in Japan and debuted in Canada at No. 7. It topped the US Top Classical Albums chart for seven consecutive weeks. With Harem, Brightman became the only artist ever to have simultaneously held the No. 1 spot in Billboard's Classical and Dance charts.

A Beautiful Day

A Beautiful Day is a live album by American jazz pianist Andrew Hill recorded in 2002 at Birdland in New York City and released on the Palmetto label.

Reception

The Allmusic review by David R. Adler awarded the album 4 stars and stated "this remarkable live album... boasts a large ensemble, billed at Birdland and previous gigs as the Andrew Hill Sextet + 11. Despite a large regiment of horns, Hill's reflective piano figures prominently... With its wide array of available textures and juxtapositions, the big band proves an ideal vehicle for Hill's powerful, unclassifiable music".

Track listing

Personnel

Beautiful Day

"Beautiful Day" is a song by the Irish rock band U2. It is the first track from their 2000 album, All That You Can't Leave Behind, and it was released as the album's lead single. It was a commercial success, helping launch the album to multi-platinum status, and is one of U2's biggest hits to date. Like many tracks from All That You Can't Leave Behind, "Beautiful Day" harkens back to the group's past sound. The tone of the Edge's guitar was a subject of debate amongst the band members, as they disagreed on whether he should use a sound similar to that from their early career in the 1980s. Lead singer Bono explained that the upbeat track is about losing everything but still finding joy in what one has.

The song received positive reviews, and it became their fourth number-one single in the UK and their first number-one in the Netherlands. The song peaked at number 21 in the United States, the band's highest position since "Discothèque" in 1997. In 2001, the song won three Grammy Awards for Song of the Year, Record of the Year, and Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal. The group has played "Beautiful Day" at every one of their concerts since the song's 2001 live debut on the Elevation Tour.

Lee DeWyze

Leon James "Lee" DeWyze, Jr. (born April 2, 1986) is an American singer-songwriter from Mount Prospect, Illinois, and the winner of the ninth season of American Idol. Prior to Idol, DeWyze had a solo career and formed the Lee DeWyze Band. He had also released two independent albums called So I'm Told in 2007 and Slumberland in 2010, both on WuLi Records. His first post-Idol album Live It Up was released on November 16, 2010, through RCA Records. WuLi Records, citing demand from DeWyze's fan base, released a third album of pre-Idol recordings, What Once Was, on February 14, 2012. His fifth studio album Frames was released on August 20, 2013, and his sixth album Oil & Water was released on February 12, 2016.

Background

DeWyze was born in Mount Prospect, Illinois, the eldest son of Kathleen (née Donahue) and Leon (Lee) DeWyze, Sr., who worked as a postal carrier in Elk Grove Village, Illinois. He has two older sisters, Shannon and Sarah, and a younger brother, Michael. His musical influences include Cat Stevens, Eric Clapton, Ben Harper, and Simon & Garfunkel.

Beautiful Day (3 Colours Red song)

"Beautiful Day" was the first single from 3 Colours Red's second album, Revolt. It was released on Creation Records in 1999.

The song was written by frontman/bassist Pete Vuckovic and recorded at Westside Studios in London. It surprised many, showing a more sensitive and epic side to the band's previously punk/pop-dominated sound (although their debut album featured 'Fit Boy and Faint Girl' and 'Copper Girl' which were both in a similar vein). It went on to become the band's biggest commercial hit, reaching number 11 in the UK charts in January 1999, throwing them further into the media spotlight at a time when the talk surrounding the band was of them being dropped. It also paved the way for the band's American campaign where the song received considerable radio airplay, even entering the charts. The band toured the US with Silverchair, and Vuckovic subsequently did an acoustic promotional tour of radio stations on the back of the song's success.

It was later perhaps incorrectly and naively blamed for splitting the band up, having allegedly distanced Vuckovic from his bandmates and fuelled a creative power struggle between him and his co-writer, Chris McCormack. However, the band reformed three years later and went on to play the song at every gig. The video for the song can be found on youtube.com where it has currently enjoyed 6 times as many 'hits' as anything else the band recorded or released, and played a massive part in procuring the band the opening slot at Wembley Stadium in 1999 (opening for Aerosmith).