Far and away theme enya biography

Irish singer (born 1961)

For other uses, see Enya (disambiguation).

Musical artist

Eithne Pádraigín Ní Bhraonáin (born 17 May 1961; anglicised as Enya Patricia Brennan), known mononymously as Enya, is an Irish singer and composer. With an estimated equivalent of over 90 million album sales worldwide, Enya is the best-selling Irish solo artist; the second-best-selling music act from Ireland overall after the rock band U2. Enya's music has been widely recognised for its use of multi-layers of her own vocals and instrumentation, lengthened reverb, and interwoven elements of Celtic music. Her career in music spans four decades; Enya has been composing and recording music since the 1980s.

Enya was raised in the Irish-speaking region of Gweedore. In 1980, as Eithne Ní Bhraonáin, Enya began her musical career playing alongside her family's Irish folk band Clannad. She left Clannad in 1982 to pursue a solo career, working with the former Clannad manager and producer, Nicky Ryan, and his partner Roma, as their lyricist. Over the following four years, Enya further developed her sound by combining multitracked vocals and keyboards with elements from a variety of musical genres, such as Celtic, classical, church, jazz, hip-hop, ambient, world, and Irish folk.

Enya's earliest composition releases as a solo artist were two piano/synthesiser instrumentals for the Touch Travel T4 cassette compilation (1984) composed around 1982–83. The majority of the soundtrack for The Frog Prince (1985) was originally composed b

1992 single by Enya

"Book of Days" is a song by Irish musician Enya. The original version, included on her 1991 album Shepherd Moons, is sung in Irish Gaelic. The subsequent 1992 single version is bilingual, with new English lyrics; this version was recorded for Ron Howard's film Far and Away, and scenes from the film feature in the video. The bilingual English-Irish version replaced the original pure Gaelic version on subsequent pressings of Shepherd Moons from mid-1992 onwards, making the original recording relatively rare.

"Book of Days" became Enya's second top-10 single on the UK Singles Chart, peaking at number 10, and reached number 12 on the Irish Singles Chart. It was used as a temp track during the editing of James Cameron's film Titanic, for the scene eventually accompanied by the musical cue called "Take Her To Sea, Mr. Murdoch" on the finished soundtrack by James Horner.

Critical reception

Ned Raggett from AllMusic stated that the singer's "trademark understated drama [are] in full flow" on the "wonderful" song.Gavin Report wrote, "This is a melodic and harmonic masterpiece with all the elements to make it a classic."Music & Media said, "Taken from the motion picture Far and Away, this is the sung version of the original ethereal Clannad instrumental."Music Week commented, that Enya's "latest sonic soundscape, Book Of Days, is typically mellifluous. Multi-textured yet as light as air".

Track listings