Jump to content

Caroline Lavelle

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Caroline Lavelle
Caroline Lavelle (2012)
Caroline Lavelle (2012)
Background information
GenresPop rock, alternative, folk
Occupation(s)Musician, songwriter
Instrument(s)Cello, singing
WebsiteCarolineLavelle.com

Caroline Lavelle is an English singer-songwriter and cellist who has created three solo albums and contributed vocals, music, and production help to many other artists and bands.[1][2]

Career

[edit]

Lavelle studied at the Royal College of Music in London. Throughout the early to mid-eighties she busked in the city, often outside Kensington Tube Station and Covent Garden, playing baroque music with Anne Stephenson and Virginia Astley (or Virginia Hewes; sources are confused) in a group called Humouresque.

She was spotted by Frankie Gavin, a member of Ireland's De Dannan band, who asked her to join. She was part of the band up to the early nineties, alongside Mary Black and Dolores Keane.

In 1992, she contributed vocals and cello to the track "Home of the Whale" on the Massive Attack EP Hymn of the Big Wheel. Producer William Orbit liked it, contacted her, and eventually produced, and mixed, her debut solo album, Spirit, in 1995. Her version of the song "Moorlough Shore" was used for the introduction to Paul Haggis's critically acclaimed crime drama EZ Streets. This brought her greater notice in the areas of film and television. Also in 1995, she began recording with Canadian world music artist Loreena McKennitt, recording and touring as part of McKennitt's band.

A December 1999 article in The Sunday Times reported that it was this album which drew Madonna's attention and initiated the successful collaboration of William Orbit and Madonna.

She produced two further albums, Brilliant Midnight (2001), which, a year later, had three further tracks added in a reissue, and A Distant Bell in (2004).

Her "Home of the Whale" track (with Massive Attack) was featured in the 2000 Ewan McGregor/Ashley Judd film, Eye of the Beholder, and she also contributed her song Anxiety to the soundtrack of the 2001 John Dahl movie Roadkill (Joyride in the US).

She lives in Tintagel in Cornwall. She was on Loreena McKennitt's Ancient Muse tour. In early 2013, Lavelle began work on a new collaborative project with singer/songwriter Andrew Bate.

In 2016, she released an album titled Secret Sky as one of a trio by the same name. The other members are Brian Hughes and Hugh Marsh. In 2023, Secret Sky released a second album, Opium.

Collaborations

[edit]
Artist Album Year Contribution Song
Art of Trance Voice of Earth 1999 Vocals & lyrics "Breathe"
Afro Celt Sound System Sound Magic Volume 1 1995 Cello, vocals & giggling Jam Nation's "She Moved Through the Fair"
All About Eve Scarlet and Other Stories 1989 Cello "Gold and Silver"
"Tuesday's Child"
BT Emotional Technology 2003 Cello & vocals "The Great Escape"
Chicane Far from the Maddening Crowds 1997 Vocals & co-writing "Lost You Somewhere"
De Dannan Ballroom 1987 Cello, vocals & other arrangements All
Electric Strings Quartet with The Pogues Pogue Mahone 1996 Cello "Anniversary"
"Love You 'Til the End"
"Pont Mirabeau"
Fun Boy Three Waiting 1983 Cello All
Hector Zazou Lights in the Dark
Strong Currents
L'Absence 		1998
2003
2004 		Cello
Vocals & lyrics
Vocals & lyrics 		All
"The Freeze"
"Lies Will Flow"
Loreena McKennitt A Winter Garden
The Book of Secrets
Live Paris & Toronto
An Ancient Muse
Nights from the Alhambra
A Midwinter Night's Dream
A Mediterranean Odyssey
The Wind That Shakes the Barley
Troubadours on the Rhine
The Journey So Far + A Midsummer Night's Tour
Lost Souls
The Visit - The Definitive Edition 		1995
1997
1999
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2012
2014
2018
2021 		Cello
Cello
Cello
Cello
Cello
Cello
Cello
Cello
Cello
Cello & backing vocals
Cello, concertina & recorder
Cello & background vocals 		All except tracks 1 & 3
All except tracks 1, 3, 4, 6 & 7
All
All except tracks 1 & 4
All
All except tracks 5, 6 & 11
All except CD1 track 4 and CD2 tracks 1, 2, 6, 7 & 9
All except track 9
All
All except CD1 tracks 1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 10 & 11
All
CD4 tracks 10, 11, 12, 13, 14 & 15
Mary Black No Frontiers 1989 Cello "The Shadow"
"Columbus"
Massive Attack Hymn of the Big Wheel EP 1992 Vocals & cello "Home of the Whale"
Muse Origin of Symmetry 2001 Cello "Megalomania"
"Citizen Erased"
Nigel Kennedy Kafka 1996 Vocals & co-writing "Breathing Stone"
Peter Gabriel Us 1992 Cello "Love to Be Loved"
"Washing of the Water"
"Secret World"
Radiohead The Bends 1995 Cello "Fake Plastic Trees"
"Nice Dream"
Sleepthief The Dawnseeker
Labyrinthine Heart
Mortal Longing 		2006
2009
2018 		Vocals & writing "Nightjar"
"Rainy World"
"Asleep in Metropolis"
Tarja Turunen Colours in the Dark 2013 Cello "Deliverance"
"Until Silence"
The Chieftains Further Down the Old Plank Road 2003 Cello "The Raggle Taggle Gypsy"
"The Lily of the West"
The Undertones The Sin of Pride 1983 Cello "Valentine's Treatment"
"Luxury"
Vangelis Voices 1995 Vocals & lyrics "Come to Me"
Thomas Dolby Forty 2001 Cello & background vocals "I Love You Goodbye"
"My Brain Is Like a Sieve"
"Hyperactive!"

She has also worked with The Durutti Column, Laurie Anderson, The Waterboys, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Graham Parker, The Cranberries, and Ryuichi Sakamoto. Art of Trance has remixed some of her songs.

Discography

[edit]

Albums

[edit]
  • Spirit (1995)
  1. "Turning Ground"
  2. "Moorlough Shore"
  3. "Dream of Picasso"
  4. "Forget the Few"
  5. "Lagan Love"
  6. "A Case of You"
  7. "Waiting for Rain"
  8. "Desire"
  9. "The Island"
  10. "Sleep Now"
  11. "Sheherezade"
  • Brilliant Midnight (2001)
  1. "Farther than the Sun"
  2. "Anxiety"
  3. "Anima Rising"
  4. "She Said"
  5. "All I Have"
  6. "The Fall"
  7. "Siamant'o"
  8. "Karma"
  9. "Mangoes"
  10. "Le Pourquoi"
  11. "Firefly Night"
  12. "Universal"
  13. "Twisted Ends"
  • Brilliant Midnight 2.0 (2002)

(As above, but with 3 extra tracks):

  1. "Lost Voices"
  2. "Home of the Whale"
  3. "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face"
  • A Distant Bell (2004)
  1. "Gently Johnny"
  2. "So Uncool"
  3. "Innocence Sleeping"
  4. "Banks of the Nile"
  5. "Simple Lyric"
  6. "No More Words"
  7. "Too Late"
  8. "The Trees They Do Grow High"
  9. "Greenwood Laddie"
  10. "Timeless"
  11. "Handful of Ashes"
  12. "Farewell to Music (w. Paddy Moloney of The Chieftains)"
  13. "Gently Johnny (Extended Version)"

Singles

[edit]

Moorlough Shore
N-Gram Recordings (1995)

  1. "Moorlough Shore" (LP Mix) – 4.20
  2. "Moorlough Shore" (Eye of the Storm Mix) – 5.39
  3. "Moorlough Shore" (Thermionic Resonance Mix), 90 BPM, vocal – 5.30
  4. "Moorlough Shore" (Thermionic Resonance Mix), 97 BPM, dub – 5.22
  5. "Moorlough Shore" (Thermionic Resonance Mix), 90 BPM, dub – 5.47
  6. "Moorlough Shore" (Thermionic Resonance Mix), 107 BPM, dub – 5.45

A Case of You
N-Gram Recordings (1995)

  1. "A Case of You" (Single Mix) – 4.30
  2. "Dream of Picasso" (Monka Monka Mix) – 6.53
  3. "A Case of You" (Psovi Psovi Mix) – 4.31

References

[edit]
  1. ^ Unterberger, Richie. "Biography: Caroline Lavelle". AllMusic. Retrieved 26 April 2010.
  2. ^ "Caroline Lavelle is creating Music & Words". Patreon.com. Retrieved 19 May 2020.
[edit]
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Caroline_Lavelle&oldid=1227930220"