Eternal Melody II is the second classical studio album by Japanese musician

Yoshiki Yoshiki is a masculine Japanese given name. Written forms Yoshiki can be written using many different combinations of kanji characters. Here are some examples: *義樹, "justice, tree" *義基, "justice, foundation" *義機, "justice, opportuni ...

. It was released on March 23, 2005.

Overview

In 1993, Yoshiki recorded his first classical studio album, '' Eternal Melody'', in

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

at the studios owned by English record producer

Sir George Martin Sir George Henry Martin (3 January 1926 – 8 March 2016) was an English record producer, arranger, composer, conductor, and musician. He was commonly referred to as the "fifth Beatle" because of his extensive involvement in each of the Beatle ...

, who produced and co-arranged the album, with the music performed by the

London Philharmonic Orchestra The London Philharmonic Orchestra (LPO) is a British orchestra based in London. One of five permanent symphony orchestras in London, the LPO was founded by the conductors Thomas Beecham, Sir Thomas Beecham and Malcolm Sargent in 1932 as a riv ...

. It mostly included orchestral arrangements of songs from his band

X Japan is a Japanese Rock music, rock band from Chiba Prefecture, Chiba, formed in 1982 by drummer and pianist Yoshiki (musician), Yoshiki and lead vocalist Toshi (musician), Toshi. Starting as a predominantly power metal, power/speed metal band with ...

. This second album was recorded in the

Los Angeles County, California Los Angeles County, officially the County of Los Angeles and sometimes abbreviated as LA County, is the List of United States counties and county equivalents, most populous county in the United States, with 9,663,345 residents estimated in 202 ...

; in his own Extasy Recording Studio,

O'Henry Sound Studios O'Henry Sound Studios was a commercial studio complex in Burbank, California, Burbank, California, that was owned by engineer Hank Sanicola and his wife, Jacqueline Sanicola.

, and

Paramount Pictures Paramount Pictures Corporation, commonly known as Paramount Pictures or simply Paramount, is an American film production company, production and Distribution (marketing), distribution company and the flagship namesake subsidiary of Paramount ...

Scoring Stage M facility. All songs were written and composed by Yoshiki.

Composition

The albums contains two songs from his first single "Amethyst", the title track and "Ima wo Dakishimete". The second song was also released as a single in

karaoke is a type of interactive entertainment system usually offered in nightclubs and bars, where people sing along to pre-recorded accompaniment using a microphone. Its musical content is an instrumental rendition of a well-known popular song. I ...

adaptation, in 1994 was the 35th annual best-selling single, and won the "Excellence Award" at the ''

36th Japan Record Awards The 36th Japan Record Awards were held on December 31, 1994, and were broadcast live on TBS. Award winners *Japan Record Award: **Takeshi Kobayashi (producer), Kazutoshi Sakurai (Songwriter and Composer) & Mr. Children for " Innocent World" * ...

''. There are two orchestral arrangements of

's songs " Longing" and " Forever Love", studio versions of songs from Yoshiki's symphonic concerts held in 2002, and the new song "Without You". It also includes songs by his solo project Violet UK, "Unnamed Song" and "Red Christmas". The first features female singer Daughter, who performed it in his concerts in 2002. The song "I'll Be Your Love" could possibly belong to his solo project as it was also performed for the first time in 2002, sung by

Nicole Scherzinger Nicole Prascovia Elikolani Scherzinger ( ; ; born June 29, 1978) is an American singer, songwriter, dancer, actress, and television personality. She was a member of the girl group and dance ensemble the Pussycat Dolls between 2003 and 2010. With ...

. However, the song was released in 2003 as the debut single for American-Japanese female singer Dahlia, and was used as the theme song for the world fair

Expo 2005 Expo 2005 was a world expo held for 185 days between Friday, March 25 and Sunday, September 25, 2005, in Aichi Prefecture, Japan, east of the city of Nagoya. Japan has also hosted Expo '70 Osaka (World Expo), Expo '75 Okinawa (Specialised Expo) ...

, held in Japan, where Yoshiki conducted the orchestra in the opening ceremony. The album also includes; an orchestrated version of, one of the few songs he contributed while in

Tetsuya Komuro is a Japanese musician, songwriter and record producer. He is recognized as the most successful producer in Japanese music history and has introduced contemporary electronic dance music to the Japanese mainstream. He was also a former owner of t ...

's pop band

Globe A globe is a spherical Earth, spherical Model#Physical model, model of Earth, of some other astronomical object, celestial body, or of the celestial sphere. Globes serve purposes similar to maps, but, unlike maps, they do not distort the surface ...

, "Seize the Light", the theme song "Kimi Dake Dakara" for the TV

NHK , also known by its Romanization of Japanese, romanized initialism NHK, is a Japanese public broadcasting, public broadcaster. It is a statutory corporation funded by viewers' payments of a television licence, television license fee. NHK ope ...

's 50th anniversary commemorative broadcast, and the song "Anniversary" which he composed and performed at the request of the Japanese government at a celebration in honor of the tenth anniversary of Emperor

Akihito Akihito (born 23 December 1933) is a member of the Imperial House of Japan who reigned as the 125th emperor of Japan from 1989 until 2019 Japanese imperial transition, his abdication in 2019. The era of his rule was named the Heisei era, Hei ...

's enthronement in 1999.

Release

The album was released on March 23, 2005, by

Nippon Columbia , often pronounced ''Korombia'', operating internationally as , is a Japanese record label founded in 1910 as Nipponophone Co., Ltd. It affiliated itself with the Columbia Graphophone Company of the United Kingdom and adopted the standard UK C ...

. It debuted in third place on the

Oricon , established in 1999, is the holding company at the head of a Japanese corporate group that supplies statistics Statistics (from German language, German: ', "description of a State (polity), state, a country") is the discipline that ...

daily charts, and reached number fourteen on the weekly chart in the initial counting week of April, with sales of 16,241 copies, and charted for six weeks.

Track listing

Recording personnel

* Piano & harpsichord: Yoshiki * Vocals: Daughter (T-1) * Orchestra arrangement: Yoshiki,

Shelly Berg Shelton "Shelly" Glen Berg (born August 18, 1955) is an American classical and jazz pianist and music educator. He is the dean of the Frost School of Music at the University of Miami in Coral Gables, Florida and the school's Patricia L. Frost Profe ...

Ikurō Fujiwara is a Japanese pianist, composer, conductor and musical producer signed under Being Inc. He is Pops Executive Producer in the Pacific Philharmonia Tokyo orchestra. Biography Ikurō started learning piano and composing from an early age. He stu ...

Dick Marx Richard Henry Marx (April 12, 1924 – August 12, 1997) was an American jazz pianist and arranger. He also composed for film, television, and commercials. Personal life Marx and wife Ruth (née Guildoo) had a son, Richard Marx, pop singer, s ...

* Recording engineer:

Steve Churchyard Steve Churchyard is an English audio engineer and record producer who came to prominence working with the Pretenders. Career Churchyard grew up in Surbiton He attended senior school at Surbiton Grammar school in Thames ditton whilst he and his p ...

, Tar Miller, Hideaki Okuhara, Suga Takao * Mixing engineer:

Joe Chiccarelli Joe Chiccarelli is an American record producer, mixer and engineer, who is a native of Boston, Massachusetts, and has been active since the 1980s. He has produced albums by Julieta Venegas, Jason Mraz, Morrissey, Oingo Boingo, Spoon, Young the Gi ...

, Steve Schurchyard, Rich Breen, Suga Takao

References

{{Authority control 2005 albums Yoshiki (musician) albums