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Shania Twain, OC (born Eilleen
Regina Edwards, August 28, 1965, Windsor, Ontario) is a Canadian singer
and songwriter in the country and pop music genres. Her third album Come
on Over is the biggest-selling album of all time by a female musician, and
the best-selling album in the history of country music. She is the only
female musician to have three albums certified Diamond by the Recording
Industry Association of America, and is also the best selling artist in
Canada, with all three of her studio albums being certified double diamond
by the Canadian Recording Industry Association. Twain has achieved both
critical and financial success, having received five Grammy awards, 27 BMI
Songwriter awards, and sold over 65 million albums worldwide to date.[
Twain is the daughter of Sharon and Clarence Edwards, who divorced when
she was two. Her mother then moved Eilleen and her sister Jill to Timmins,
Ontario where her mother met and married Jerry Twain, a native Ojibwa
Indian. He then adopted Eilleen, and her name was changed to Eilleen
Twain. She has in the past referred to herself ancestrally as an Ojibwa
Indian, but her background is Irish and French.
One of five children, Eilleen Twain had a hard childhood in Timmins,
Ontario. Her parents earned little, and there was often a shortage of food
and money in the household. In the remote, rugged community she learned to
hunt and to chop wood. 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 at the age of just eight to try to make ends meet often earning
twenty dollars, between midnight and two in the morning when the bar had
closed but the people remained. Although she has expressed a 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 a
successful singer. At one point, while Jerry was at work, her mother drove
the family 425 miles to a Toronto homeless shelter for assistance (source:
Shania's interview in Readers Digest).
Career as "Eilleen"
At the age of thirteen, Eilleen Twain was invited to perform on CBC
television's Tommy Hunter Show. While attending Timmins High and
Vocational School in Timmins, Ontario, she was the singer for a local band
called "Longshot" which covered Top 40 music.
In 1984, she sang a duet performance on an album by Canadian musician (and
present-day CKTB radio personality) Tim Denis.
When her mother and adoptive father died in a car accident on November 1,
1987, the 22-year-old Twain put her musical career on hold and took care
of her family. She and her half-brothers Mark and Darryl, and sister
Carrie-Ann moved to Huntsville, Ontario, where she supported them by
performing at the nearby Deerhurst Resort.
After "Eilleen" becomes "Shania"
1993: Shania Twain
Shania Twain's self-titled debut albumIn 1991, she was invited to record a
demo tape in Huntsville, Ontario. That led to her first recording contract
with entertainment lawyer Richard Frank, whereupon she changed her name to
Shania [Sha-nye-uh] an Ojibwa word which means "On my way".
Twain co-wrote only one of the songs ("God Ain't Gonna Getcha for That")
on her self-titled debut album. The album's first two singles, "What Made
You Say That" and "Dance with the One That Brought You" peaked at #55 on
the Billboard Country Charts. By the end of 1993 the album had sold fewer
than 250,000 copies.
That same year, Twain sang harmony vocals on Sammy Kershaw's Haunted Heart
album.
1995—1996: The Woman in Me
Shania Twain's The Woman in Me albumWhen rock producer Robert John "Mutt"
Lange heard Twain's original songs and singing, he offered to produce her
and to write songs with her. After many telephone conversations, they met
in person at Nashville's Fan Fair in June 1993. Initially Shania had no
idea who he was but expressed a high degree of praise for his demos on the
phone. Mutt had frequently mentioned Bryan to her and it was only after
some time she realised he was talking about Bryan Adams whom she was a fan
of. Twain and Lange became very close within just weeks.
Lange and Twain started working on a second album, and in 1995 The Woman
in Me produced her first #1 single, "Any Man of Mine". The album topped
the country charts for months and crossed over to mainstream charts,
peaking at No. 5. As of 2007 it has sold more than 12 million copies. 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.
1997—2000: Come on Over
Shania Twain's Come on Over albumIn 1997, Twain released her follow-up
album, Come on Over. This was the album that established Twain 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. Songs like "Don't Be Stupid", "Honey,
I'm Home", "Man! I Feel Like a Woman!", "That Don't Impress Me Much" and
"From This Moment On" joined the 12 songs that eventually saw release as
singles.
The album stayed on the charts for the next two years. Come on Over had
sold 20 million copies in the United States and over 34 million worldwide,
making it the biggest-selling album of all time by a female musician, and
the biggest-selling country album of all time.
Songs from the album won four Grammy Awards over the next two years,
including Best Country Song for Twain and Lange for "You're Still the One"
and "Come on Over" and Best Female Country Performance for "You're Still
the One" and "Man! I Feel Like a Woman!"
Despite the album's sale record it wasn't able to top the Billboard 200,
reaching a peak of #2. In 1999, the "Come on Over" album was remixed for
the European market as a pop version with less country instruments and
actually gave her the big breakthrough in whole Europe. "Come on over"
went to No.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 1 million copies in both, the
UK and Germany. The songs that had finally put the huge European attention
to the album had been the (both pop remixed)singles "That don't impress me
much", a No.3 in the UK and Top 10 hit in Germany in summer of 1999 and
"Man! I Feel Like a Woman!", peaking at No.3 in both, the UK and France in
autumn. Additionally, the album set the record for the longest ever stay
in the Top 20 of The US Billboard 200, remaining in the Top 20 for 99
weeks.
Twain's mainstream pop acceptance was further helped by her appearance in
the 1998 first edition of the VH1 Divas concert, where she sang alongside
Mariah Carey, Céline Dion, Gloria Estefan and Aretha Franklin and by VH1's
1999 heavily-aired 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, a veteran of many large-scale tours with Bruce Springsteen.
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.
2002—2004: Up!
Shania Twain's Up! albumAfter a two year break, Twain went back into the
studio, along with a management change (Twain dropped Landau and went with
QPrime), and recorded her latest CD. Up! was released on November 19,
2002. About a year later, Shania kicked off the Up! Tour in
Hamilton,Ontario, Canada on September 25, 2003.
Up! was released as a double album, with three different "remix" discs -
pop (a red CD), country (a green CD) and Indian (a blue CD). For North
American markets, the pop disc was paired with the country disc and in
international markets, the pop disc was paired with the Indian/Latin disc.
The Indian disc was recorded in Mumbai, India. Up! was given 4 out of 5
stars by Rolling Stone magazine, and debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard
albums chart, selling 874,000 in the first week alone. It charted at the
top for five weeks. The success of the albums pop version outide the US
was equally amazing when "Up!" reached No.1 in Germany, No.2 in Australia
and the Top Five in the UK and France. Especially in Germany it became a
real longseller, certified quadruple platinum and stayed in the Top 100
for 1 and a half years.
The first single from the album "I'm Gonna Getcha Good!", became a modest
country hit in the US, 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 Shania
was criticising that money makes the world go around. The song eventually
became another smash hit in the important European markets, reaching No.3
in Germany, 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 number four on the country chart and number one
on the Adult Contemporary chart, and made as well the Billboard Top 20.
Again success was even bigger on the other side of the Atlantic 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 country
top-ten 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 3 singles, 2
more singles were released in the 2nd half of 2003 with up-tempo "Thank
you baby" (No.11 in the UK, Top 20 in Germany) and just before Christmas
the romantic, acoustic ballad "When You Kiss Me", at least a minor hit in
both territories. The title track "Up!" also saw a single release in a
limited edition of European countries, such as Germany, in early 2004.
To date , Up! has sold 5.5 million copies in the U.S. (Certified by the
RIAA as 11 times platinum due to the organization's rules regarding double
albums, which are counted as 2 units for certifications) and over 17
million copies worldwide.
In 2003, Twain participated in the Dolly Parton tribute album, Just
Because I'm a Woman, covering Parton's classic "Coat of Many Colors", as a
duet with Alison Krauss & Union Station. 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—present: Greatest Hits
Shania Twain's Greatest Hits albumIn 2004, she released the Greatest Hits
album, with three new tracks. To date, it has sold over 3.5 million copies
in the U.S., and over 7.5 million worldwide. The first single, the
multi-format duet "Party for Two", made the country top ten with Billy
Currington, while the pop 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" didn't fare as well, the former made top
twenty AC, while the latter didn't gain enough airplay to even crack the
country top 40.
In August 2005, when Twain hit 40, she released the single "Shoes" from
the Desperate Housewives soundtrack. It did not do well, and therefore,
the video was cancelled.
Forthcoming album
At the Academy of Country Music Awards in Las Vegas on May 16, 2007, Twain
said that she was currently writing songs for a new album, and that she is
doing a "lot of soul searching" and "indulging in the writing". When asked
with new music will come out she said "next year".
Shania will be featured on the song, "You Needed Me", with Canadian
country star Anne Murray on Anne's upcoming duets album due out November
13, 2007 in Canada, and in January 2008 in the US.
Personal life
Shania married music producer Robert John "Mutt" Lange on December 28,
1993. The couple have a son, Eja D'Angelo (pronounced "Asia") who was born
on August 12, 2001. Twain and her family currently reside in Switzerland
and New Zealand, where they own several horses. The Langes are
vegetarians.
Twain's commercial ventures outside of the music industry include a series
of cosmetic ads in 1999 based on "Man! I Feel Like a Woman!" for Revlon.
In 2005, Twain partnered with COTY for the creation of her fragrance
Shania by Stetson.
Despite the Revlon adverts and venture into the perfume market, Shania has
confessed that she is uneasy about being a sex symbol and has often felt
uncomfortable and stressed during photo shoots where she believes it is
music that will last forever, not an image. "When I began singing I wanted
to be a backing singer for Dolly Parton or Stevie Wonder, I didn't sign up
to be a model or actress and didn't want fame," she has said. "For me it's
all about music. Music is when I feel at my best, spiritually, emotionally
and physically".
According to Shania one of her beauty tips is applying an ointment that is
normally applied to cow's udders during the winter months to protect it
from the harsh weather. Shania has confessed to using the covering on her
legs and all over her face for clear skin.
In November 2005, Twain appeared on an episode of the reality show The
Apprentice. In September 2007, Twain released a second fragrance from COTY
called, "Shania Starlight".
Twain is a fan of Australian hard rock band AC/DC, a band who her husband
produced a number of albums for. Twain has performed some of their songs,
notably "You Shook Me All Night Long" for her Up! Close and Personal
televised concert and is often seen wearing an AC/DC vest or t-shirt. |
