DISCOGRAPHY – VOLUME VII

1)Waltzer of Hearts – Prandi Sounds

Instrumental

2)Viennese waltz

Instrumental

3)Closest thing to crazy - Katie Melua

How can I think I'm standing strong ?
Yet feel the air beneath my feet.
How can happiness feel so wrong ?
How can misery feel so sweet ?
How can you let me watch you sleep ?
Then break my dreams the way you do.
How can I have got in so deep ?
Why did I fall in love with you ?
(Chorus)
This is the closest thing to crazy
I have ever been.
Feeling twenty-two, acting seventeen.
This is the nearest thing to crazy
I have ever known.
I was never crazy on my own.
And now I know
That there's a link between the two,
Being close to craziness, and being close to you
How can you make me fall apart ?
Then break my fall with loving lies.
It's so easy to break a heart,
It's so easy to close your eyes.
How can you treat me like a child ?
Yet like a child I yearn for you.
How can anyone feel so wild ?
How can anyone feel so blue ?
(Chorus)
This is the closest thing to crazy
I have ever been.
Feeling twenty-two, acting seventeen.
This is the nearest thing to crazy
I have ever known.
I was never crazy on my own.
And now I know
That there's a link between the two,
Being close to craziness, and being close to you
And being close to you
And being close to you

ABOUT KATIE MELUA

Ketevan Melua was born in Kutaisi, Georgia, which was part of the Soviet Union, in 1984 and spent her first years with her grandparents in the capital Tbilisi before moving, with her parents and brother, to the town of Batumi, Ajaria where her father worked as a heart specialist. During this time Melua experienced severe poverty, having to carry buckets of water up four flights of stairs to her family's flat. Melua would later cite this experience as the reason why she shuns certain materialistic aspects of fame and fortune.

In 1993, in the aftermath of the Georgian Civil War, the family moved to Belfast, Northern Ireland, where her father took up a position at the prestigious Royal Victoria Hospital. Whilst living in Belfast, Melua attended Roman Catholic schools, St. Catherine's Primary School and Dominican College, Fortwilliam, while her younger brother attended Protestant schools. The family moved again to Redhill, Surrey, in 1998. As a result of her diverse upbringing at an early age, Melua can speak three languages: Georgian, Russian and English.

First television appearance

Due to her politically unstable upbringing in Georgia and troubled Belfast, Melua initially planned to become either a historian or a politician. This changed in 2000, at the age of 15, when Melua took part in a talent competition on British television channel ITV called "Stars Up Their Nose" (a spoof of Stars in Their Eyes) and was part of the children's program "Mad for it!". Melua won the contest by singing Badfinger's Without You. The prize was £350 worth of MFI vouchers with which she bought a chair for her father. Had she lost the contest, she would have been gunged.

Schooling

After completing her GCSEs at Nonsuch High School in Surrey, Melua attended the BRIT School for the Performing Arts in the London Borough of Croydon, undertaking a BTEC with an A-level in music. She began to write songs whilst at the school. Melua first met her future manager, producer Mike Batt, when studying at the school.

Adrenaline junkie

Melua is sometimes referred to as an 'adrenaline junkie' as she enjoys rollercoasters and fun fairs and often paraglides and hang glides.[23] She has also skydived twice and taken several flying lessons and in 2004 she was lowered from a 200 metre building in New Zealand at 60mph. When asked about Melua being an 'adrenaline junkie', Mike Batt said, "she enjoys extremes, but in life her emotions are always in check.

British nationality

On 10 August2005, Melua became a British citizen along with her parents and brother. The citizenship ceremony took place in Weybridge, Surrey.The ceremony was important to Melua because if her father had lost his job before becoming a citizen, the family would have been forced to return to Georgia. On gaining British nationality, Melua was eligible for a British passport, which makes it easier for her to travel around the world. Becoming a British citizen meant that Melua had held three citizenships before she was 21; first Soviet, then Georgian and finally British.

Mike Batt

It was whilst performing at a Brit School showcase that Melua caught the eye of Mike Batt, an English songwriter and producer who was looking for an artist capable of singing "jazz and blues in an interesting way". After hearing Melua sing "Faraway voice" (a song of her own composition, about the death of her idol Eva Cassidy) Batt signed the 19-year-old Melua to his small Dramatico recording and management company and sent her into the studio.

Call Off the Search

Call Off the Search featured two songs written by Melua; "Belfast (Penguins and Cats)", a song about Melua's own experience of her time in the troubled city and "Faraway voice", a song about the death of Eva Cassidy. It was initially difficult for Melua and Batt to get airplay for the album's lead single, "The Closest Thing to Crazy". This changed when BBC Radio 2 producer Paul Walters heard the single and played it on the popular Terry Wogan breakfast show.The single only reached #10, but Wogan's support did raise Melua's profile and when "Call Off the Search" was released it became an immediate hit, reaching number-one on the UK album chart in January 2004.

Piece by Piece

Melua's second album, Piece by Piece, was released on September 26, 2005. It included the single "Nine Million Bicycles", which was released on September 19 of the same year.

Charity work

In November 2004 Melua was asked to take part in Band Aid 20 in which she joined a chorus of British and Irish pop stars to create a rendition of "Do They Know It's Christmas?" to raise money for famine relief in Africa. This was in celebration of the twentieth anniversary of the original Band Aid.

On March 19, 2005, Melua sang "Too Much Love Will Kill You" with Brian May at the 46664 concert in George, South Africa for Nelson Mandela's HIV charity. Melua had been a fan of Queen since her childhood in Georgia when her uncles would play the band's music, so performing with May was a realisation of a childhood dream.

Melua is a goodwill ambassador to the charity Save the Children and in 2005 she went to Sri Lanka to see the work the charity was doing for children in the area after the civil war and tsunami. In 2006 Melua donated all the proceeds from her single Spider's web to the charity.

Melua is also a supporter of the Oxfam charity shops, using them frequently to buy her clothing. Melua however, has stated that this is as much to do with her dislike of spending and glamour than support for the charity,admitting that, when out in public, she looks "like a tramp" and that her hairdresser playfully calls her look "the Romanian window cleaner".

World record holder

On 2 October2006, Melua entered the Guinness Book of Records for playing the deepest underwater concert 303 metres below sea level on Statoil's Troll A platform in the North Sea. Melua and her band underwent extensive medical tests and survival training in Norway before flying by helicopter to the rig.[44] Melua later described achieving the record as "the most surreal gig I have ever done".