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she's apparently opening for Christina Aguilera at the Emirates Palace Hotel in Abu Dhabi.
Aguilera concert to storm palace
Loveday Morris
Last Updated: October 18. 2008 8:53PM UAE / GMT
Singer Christina Aguilera at the Africa Rising Festival in London, Oct 14, 2008. J Ryan / AP
ABU DHABI // Christina Aguilera’s concert at the Emirates Palace hotel on Friday will be the biggest-budget music production the country has ever seen, with a 14-piece backing band, a light show and a fireworks display.
The Grammy award-winning singer, whose hits include Genie in a Bottle, will perform on the lawns of the hotel to an expected audience of 20,000 people.
“The show will have all the bells and whistles associated with a big American songstress,” said Lee Charteris, the event’s producer.
The stage for the concert will be built across a large central stairway, with 200 lights and three video screens, the largest of which is 10 metres wide. Radio 1 DJs will appear on a second stage before and after the concert.
Tickets, which are priced from Dh295 to Dh890 (US$80 to $222), are still available.
Aguilera is the latest in a series of stars, including Justin Timberlake, Bon Jovi and Elton John, to perform at the Emirates Palace. The success of previous shows has prompted the hotel to consider building a permanent concert stage in the grounds.
The Abu Dhabi show is part of the singer’s “Back to Basics” tour, to promote her latest multi-platinum-selling album. More subdued and sophisticated than some of her earlier shows, the tour has seen Aguilera return to her soul roots, the genre she has said most inspires her music.
Aguilera, 27, who has sold more than 25 million records worldwide, is scheduled to release her sixth album next year.
Born on Staten Island, New York, she was known to her neighbours as “the little girl with the big voice”. She got her break at the age of 12, on the US talent show Star Search, which led to a role in the Disney Channel’s children’s television show The New Mickey Mouse Club. Her recording of the theme song for the 1998 Disney film Mulan landed her a record deal with RCA.
The opening act for the concert was confirmed last week as Taleen Kalbian, an Armenian-American singer.
Four years ago, Taleen, then 16 years old, debuted in the UAE by headlining her own concert in Abu Dhabi.
Taleen, now 20, is classically trained and has been described as “the next Christina Aguilera, meets Aaliyah and Cher seasoned with a pinch of Celine Dion” with a sound that is a blend of “pop, hip-hop, opera with R&B sensibilities”.
“With a powerful voice and dynamic stage presence, Taleen was the obvious choice to be the opening act for a superstar such as Christina,” said John Lickrish, managing director for Flash, the company that organised the event.
A website, www.christinaaguilera.ae, has been set up for the Emirates Palace concert to keep fans updated.
[email protected]
An Image, a Style, Songs -- and a Plan
By Tom Jackman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, February 5, 2004; Page VA18
Taleen Kalbian may be perched on the brink of stardom as a versatile singer with a five-octave range. But she can still squeal like a teenager.
The 16-year-old from Centreville was riding in the back of a car in Abu Dhabi, where her family decided to dip her toe in the pop music waters by releasing her first single in December. It was there, in the capital of the United Arab Emirates, that Taleen experienced that seminal moment no musician ever forgets: when she heard her music on the radio for the first time.
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"Ohmigod, this is so cool!" she yelped as her mother recorded the historic event on video. "I can't believe this, I'm on the radio, ohmigod. Ohmigod, I'm so happy! . . . That's meeeeee!"
The high-pitched joy hardly sounded like the sultry woman singing "Gotta Let It Go," which Taleen (who doesn't use her last name professionally) co-wrote and co-produced. The song thumps with the funk and sass of a Beyonce Knowles cut, complete with a male rapper and a breathy vocal that bears no resemblance to any teeny-bop singer.
"That sounds wicked to me," one admiring disc jockey in Abu Dhabi told her.
Taleen's Armenian American family has been careful not to overload the career of a girl who started out as an opera prodigy, singing for Pope John Paul II at age 12. But this week, they are in New York hoping to finalize deals that would sign Taleen to a major label and have her on tour in the Middle East and Europe this spring as the opening act for an established star, said her mother, Sylva Kalbian.
Meanwhile, Taleen is bouncing between recording studios, business meetings and voice lessons in Toronto, Northern Virginia and New York, recording 11 more tracks for an album. Instead of giving herself over to the star-making machinery of a major record label, Taleen's family is financing the project themselves, they said, to prevent her from being pigeonholed into one genre and packaged for only one audience.
"She has developed her own image, her own style, her own songs," Sylva Kalbian said. "Now we're at a crossroads. We are looking for the right label, the right distribution. We've done all the background work that needs to be done."
Taleen's intelligence helps make her a participant in planning her career. "I'm hoping the album will do well overseas -- I'm releasing it there first," she explained. "Then get a distribution deal in the States, release the album over here and have it do well."
Beyond selling records, "I'd love to do a world tour and go everywhere and perform," said Taleen, who transferred from Flint Hill School to Oakton High School at the beginning of the school year so she could keep up her studies online while traveling. "And the publicity, the interviews, the whole package -- that's what I want."
Her gradual entry into professional singing has prepared the teenager perfectly. Taleen's mother, an independent business owner, and father, a lawyer, said they noticed their daughter's musical precociousness early; by age 5 she was taking voice lessons. At 9, Taleen began singing with the Washington Opera company at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. At 12, she sang the national anthem at MCI Center before a Washington Wizards game and performed the "Ave Maria" a cappella for the pope in Bethlehem and Jerusalem.
The two appearances before the pope were the highlight of her career, Taleen said. "And the single," she added, "hearing it on the radio for the first time."
Before turning 13, she belted out "The Star-Spangled Banner" at a Washington Redskins preseason game at FedEx Field. Taleen, still a small, skinny girl, finished with such a flourish that the crowd roared. Taleen's preteen exploits were chronicled in newspaper articles, including The Washington Post. As Taleen grew into her teens, she focused on school, making only a few public appearances. "We turned down so many things," Taleen said, including a White House invitation. "It was hard, to be in school, to have a normal childhood," Taleen said. "I think we handled it really well."
In April 2002, Taleen sang a medley at the annual Khalil Gibran Spirit of Humanity Awards Gala in Washington honoring Queen Noor of Jordan. The rock star Sting also appeared, later cracking, "Taleen upstaged me," her mother said.
The international star and the Flint Hill freshman hung out together that night, Taleen said, talking about Sting's old band, the Police, and about singing and style. As a result, she didn't finish her homework that night.
At school the next day, Taleen resisted the urge to brag, she said. But teachers didn't believe the "Sting-ate-my-homework" excuse. One teacher even sent her to detention, she said.
Last year, Taleen's family began shuttling her to New York to work with Don Lawrence, a voice coach who has trained singers such as Mick Jagger and Christina Aguilera. There, she also was introduced to various music industry professionals, many of whom were eager to help promote the budding singer's career.
Phil Berberian, a former music executive in New York with experience producing and managing artists, said he was knocked out the first time he heard Taleen in person.
"It was hard to believe that kind of emotion was coming out of a 16-year-old," Berberian said. "She can communicate with her audience -- I think that's what separates her."
Taleen's bubbly, youthful personality doubtless contributes to her appeal, whether she is singing for 80,000 people at FedEx Field or for 80 at Jammin' Java in Vienna. She said she feels at ease on stage.
"I know this is, like, cliche, but to see the different smiles on different faces, it doesn't feel like work," said Taleen, now a willowy 5 feet 7 inches. "The feedback that you get from the audience is different every time."
Songs like "Gotta Let It Go" are not for the Nickelodeon set. When she released the single in the United Arab Emirates, where her father sometimes does legal work, it made a serious splash.
A local magazine placed her on the cover, sandwiched between Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera. She did two concerts, combining pop and classical songs, appeared on the radio with wisecracking British disc jockeys, gave talks to two college groups and appeared on an all-business channel to discuss her career plan with a deadly serious anchorwoman. Taleen handled the appearances with poise and good humor.
Though only 16, Taleen doesn't want her audience limited to teenagers. "Normal people, they can't connect with Britney Spears," she said. "People are getting more and more into the serious, soulful artist."
Her musical influences are vast: She cites blues singers such as Etta James and Billie Holliday, hard rockers such as Metallica and System of a Down, pop artists John Mayer and Justin Timberlake, even rappers like Ludacris and Jay-Z, all incorporated into the background of classical and opera from which she started. An Armenian duduk, similar to a recorder, opens "Gotta Let It Go" before synthesizers and bass take over.
"I listen to everything," Taleen said. She calls her sound "musaique," a combination of music and mosaic, to describe her variety of sounds. "One song is almost John Mayer-like," she said of her album, "another song is a little urban, with R&B and pop. Another is a ballad with strings." The entire album is sketched out and should be done by summer.
Berberian said that for most artists, such a diversity of music styles on one album would be unsalable. But he believes Taleen can pull it off.
"We want this first effort to be a representation of all the things she can do," he said. "Most record companies would say you're crazy. But this is an unconventional situation. And I find myself thinking and doing unconventional things."
Berberian said Taleen was "very advanced as far as her ear, her production," and said she devises new ideas for arrangements or introductions on the spot. He applauded Taleen's decision to avoid a record company until the album is complete. "With a major record label, she would have no say," Berberian said. "This is going to be a lot better for her in the long run."
Marco Delmar, who is co-producing two other songs for Taleen out of his Recording Arts studio in Fairfax, said, "I'm fascinated by her material. Part of my job is to pull talent out of people. With her, it's quite the other way. It's a matter of seeing all the things that are coming at you and helping her make the best choice."
Delmar said Taleen has a uniquely bright future. "She's got a great voice, great creativity, and she's a stable person. I've seen combinations of those, but rarely all three. She's just a real joy to work with."
You can hear the first half of "Gotta Let It Go" on Taleen's Web site,www.taleen.com.
Now, that's hot.
Aguilera concert to storm palace
Loveday Morris
Last Updated: October 18. 2008 8:53PM UAE / GMT
Singer Christina Aguilera at the Africa Rising Festival in London, Oct 14, 2008. J Ryan / AP
ABU DHABI // Christina Aguilera’s concert at the Emirates Palace hotel on Friday will be the biggest-budget music production the country has ever seen, with a 14-piece backing band, a light show and a fireworks display.
The Grammy award-winning singer, whose hits include Genie in a Bottle, will perform on the lawns of the hotel to an expected audience of 20,000 people.
“The show will have all the bells and whistles associated with a big American songstress,” said Lee Charteris, the event’s producer.
The stage for the concert will be built across a large central stairway, with 200 lights and three video screens, the largest of which is 10 metres wide. Radio 1 DJs will appear on a second stage before and after the concert.
Tickets, which are priced from Dh295 to Dh890 (US$80 to $222), are still available.
Aguilera is the latest in a series of stars, including Justin Timberlake, Bon Jovi and Elton John, to perform at the Emirates Palace. The success of previous shows has prompted the hotel to consider building a permanent concert stage in the grounds.
The Abu Dhabi show is part of the singer’s “Back to Basics” tour, to promote her latest multi-platinum-selling album. More subdued and sophisticated than some of her earlier shows, the tour has seen Aguilera return to her soul roots, the genre she has said most inspires her music.
Aguilera, 27, who has sold more than 25 million records worldwide, is scheduled to release her sixth album next year.
Born on Staten Island, New York, she was known to her neighbours as “the little girl with the big voice”. She got her break at the age of 12, on the US talent show Star Search, which led to a role in the Disney Channel’s children’s television show The New Mickey Mouse Club. Her recording of the theme song for the 1998 Disney film Mulan landed her a record deal with RCA.
The opening act for the concert was confirmed last week as Taleen Kalbian, an Armenian-American singer.
Four years ago, Taleen, then 16 years old, debuted in the UAE by headlining her own concert in Abu Dhabi.
Taleen, now 20, is classically trained and has been described as “the next Christina Aguilera, meets Aaliyah and Cher seasoned with a pinch of Celine Dion” with a sound that is a blend of “pop, hip-hop, opera with R&B sensibilities”.
“With a powerful voice and dynamic stage presence, Taleen was the obvious choice to be the opening act for a superstar such as Christina,” said John Lickrish, managing director for Flash, the company that organised the event.
A website, www.christinaaguilera.ae, has been set up for the Emirates Palace concert to keep fans updated.
[email protected]
An Image, a Style, Songs -- and a Plan
By Tom Jackman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, February 5, 2004; Page VA18
Taleen Kalbian may be perched on the brink of stardom as a versatile singer with a five-octave range. But she can still squeal like a teenager.
The 16-year-old from Centreville was riding in the back of a car in Abu Dhabi, where her family decided to dip her toe in the pop music waters by releasing her first single in December. It was there, in the capital of the United Arab Emirates, that Taleen experienced that seminal moment no musician ever forgets: when she heard her music on the radio for the first time.
Free E-mail Newsletters
Today's Headlines & Columnists
See a Sample | Sign Up Now
Breaking News Alerts
See a Sample | Sign Up Now
"Ohmigod, this is so cool!" she yelped as her mother recorded the historic event on video. "I can't believe this, I'm on the radio, ohmigod. Ohmigod, I'm so happy! . . . That's meeeeee!"
The high-pitched joy hardly sounded like the sultry woman singing "Gotta Let It Go," which Taleen (who doesn't use her last name professionally) co-wrote and co-produced. The song thumps with the funk and sass of a Beyonce Knowles cut, complete with a male rapper and a breathy vocal that bears no resemblance to any teeny-bop singer.
"That sounds wicked to me," one admiring disc jockey in Abu Dhabi told her.
Taleen's Armenian American family has been careful not to overload the career of a girl who started out as an opera prodigy, singing for Pope John Paul II at age 12. But this week, they are in New York hoping to finalize deals that would sign Taleen to a major label and have her on tour in the Middle East and Europe this spring as the opening act for an established star, said her mother, Sylva Kalbian.
Meanwhile, Taleen is bouncing between recording studios, business meetings and voice lessons in Toronto, Northern Virginia and New York, recording 11 more tracks for an album. Instead of giving herself over to the star-making machinery of a major record label, Taleen's family is financing the project themselves, they said, to prevent her from being pigeonholed into one genre and packaged for only one audience.
"She has developed her own image, her own style, her own songs," Sylva Kalbian said. "Now we're at a crossroads. We are looking for the right label, the right distribution. We've done all the background work that needs to be done."
Taleen's intelligence helps make her a participant in planning her career. "I'm hoping the album will do well overseas -- I'm releasing it there first," she explained. "Then get a distribution deal in the States, release the album over here and have it do well."
Beyond selling records, "I'd love to do a world tour and go everywhere and perform," said Taleen, who transferred from Flint Hill School to Oakton High School at the beginning of the school year so she could keep up her studies online while traveling. "And the publicity, the interviews, the whole package -- that's what I want."
Her gradual entry into professional singing has prepared the teenager perfectly. Taleen's mother, an independent business owner, and father, a lawyer, said they noticed their daughter's musical precociousness early; by age 5 she was taking voice lessons. At 9, Taleen began singing with the Washington Opera company at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. At 12, she sang the national anthem at MCI Center before a Washington Wizards game and performed the "Ave Maria" a cappella for the pope in Bethlehem and Jerusalem.
The two appearances before the pope were the highlight of her career, Taleen said. "And the single," she added, "hearing it on the radio for the first time."
Before turning 13, she belted out "The Star-Spangled Banner" at a Washington Redskins preseason game at FedEx Field. Taleen, still a small, skinny girl, finished with such a flourish that the crowd roared. Taleen's preteen exploits were chronicled in newspaper articles, including The Washington Post. As Taleen grew into her teens, she focused on school, making only a few public appearances. "We turned down so many things," Taleen said, including a White House invitation. "It was hard, to be in school, to have a normal childhood," Taleen said. "I think we handled it really well."
In April 2002, Taleen sang a medley at the annual Khalil Gibran Spirit of Humanity Awards Gala in Washington honoring Queen Noor of Jordan. The rock star Sting also appeared, later cracking, "Taleen upstaged me," her mother said.
The international star and the Flint Hill freshman hung out together that night, Taleen said, talking about Sting's old band, the Police, and about singing and style. As a result, she didn't finish her homework that night.
At school the next day, Taleen resisted the urge to brag, she said. But teachers didn't believe the "Sting-ate-my-homework" excuse. One teacher even sent her to detention, she said.
Last year, Taleen's family began shuttling her to New York to work with Don Lawrence, a voice coach who has trained singers such as Mick Jagger and Christina Aguilera. There, she also was introduced to various music industry professionals, many of whom were eager to help promote the budding singer's career.
Phil Berberian, a former music executive in New York with experience producing and managing artists, said he was knocked out the first time he heard Taleen in person.
"It was hard to believe that kind of emotion was coming out of a 16-year-old," Berberian said. "She can communicate with her audience -- I think that's what separates her."
Taleen's bubbly, youthful personality doubtless contributes to her appeal, whether she is singing for 80,000 people at FedEx Field or for 80 at Jammin' Java in Vienna. She said she feels at ease on stage.
"I know this is, like, cliche, but to see the different smiles on different faces, it doesn't feel like work," said Taleen, now a willowy 5 feet 7 inches. "The feedback that you get from the audience is different every time."
Songs like "Gotta Let It Go" are not for the Nickelodeon set. When she released the single in the United Arab Emirates, where her father sometimes does legal work, it made a serious splash.
A local magazine placed her on the cover, sandwiched between Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera. She did two concerts, combining pop and classical songs, appeared on the radio with wisecracking British disc jockeys, gave talks to two college groups and appeared on an all-business channel to discuss her career plan with a deadly serious anchorwoman. Taleen handled the appearances with poise and good humor.
Though only 16, Taleen doesn't want her audience limited to teenagers. "Normal people, they can't connect with Britney Spears," she said. "People are getting more and more into the serious, soulful artist."
Her musical influences are vast: She cites blues singers such as Etta James and Billie Holliday, hard rockers such as Metallica and System of a Down, pop artists John Mayer and Justin Timberlake, even rappers like Ludacris and Jay-Z, all incorporated into the background of classical and opera from which she started. An Armenian duduk, similar to a recorder, opens "Gotta Let It Go" before synthesizers and bass take over.
"I listen to everything," Taleen said. She calls her sound "musaique," a combination of music and mosaic, to describe her variety of sounds. "One song is almost John Mayer-like," she said of her album, "another song is a little urban, with R&B and pop. Another is a ballad with strings." The entire album is sketched out and should be done by summer.
Berberian said that for most artists, such a diversity of music styles on one album would be unsalable. But he believes Taleen can pull it off.
"We want this first effort to be a representation of all the things she can do," he said. "Most record companies would say you're crazy. But this is an unconventional situation. And I find myself thinking and doing unconventional things."
Berberian said Taleen was "very advanced as far as her ear, her production," and said she devises new ideas for arrangements or introductions on the spot. He applauded Taleen's decision to avoid a record company until the album is complete. "With a major record label, she would have no say," Berberian said. "This is going to be a lot better for her in the long run."
Marco Delmar, who is co-producing two other songs for Taleen out of his Recording Arts studio in Fairfax, said, "I'm fascinated by her material. Part of my job is to pull talent out of people. With her, it's quite the other way. It's a matter of seeing all the things that are coming at you and helping her make the best choice."
Delmar said Taleen has a uniquely bright future. "She's got a great voice, great creativity, and she's a stable person. I've seen combinations of those, but rarely all three. She's just a real joy to work with."
You can hear the first half of "Gotta Let It Go" on Taleen's Web site,www.taleen.com.
Now, that's hot.
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