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-   -   Song on British Airways (https://www.fodors.com/community/europe/song-on-british-airways-315884/)

ChrisCal May 11th, 2003 07:27 PM

Song on British Airways
 
I can't believe I am obssessing so much about this but I am trying to find a song I heard on channel 9 of the British Airways music tape which sounded like Enya doing a vocal version of Beethoven's 7th symphony. I even purchased Classical Chillout CD which I thought it might be on since that was listed in their guide. Anyone else spent 10 hours listening to music on British Airways lately? Thanks, Chris

Scarlett May 11th, 2003 07:56 PM


the only BA commercial music that I know is the Flower song from a Delibes opera.
Is it two women singing? That is Delibes.:)

Scarlett May 11th, 2003 07:57 PM

That Opera is Lakme:)

Scarlett May 11th, 2003 07:59 PM

http://www.commercialbreaksandbeats....ng=british+air


fluffy May 11th, 2003 08:07 PM

Chris,
if you are interested there is a clssic public radio station in California www.kusc.org- If you become a member your gift is a wounderful cd called Listeners Choice- with a one of the cuts is the flower Duet.
Fluffy

Lola May 11th, 2003 08:09 PM

I remember one of those new age fellows, like Yanni, had a concert that featured some women singing the Flower Duet. I like the Opera version best.

ChrisCal May 11th, 2003 08:14 PM

Hey, thanks for your imput guys but I was referring to the audio tapes they have available for listening during the long flight, not an ad for British Airways. I am familiar with the Duet song and it is another I love. The tracks on the audio included Adiemus, O mio bambino caro, Flower Duet, the Lark Ascending. It is a classical "chillout" collection and the song I am trying to find (and believe me, I've tried everything was a new age Enya-style version of the 2nd movement of Beethoven's 7th. I guess I will have to fly to London again to hear it. Thanks for your help Chris

nigel May 11th, 2003 11:46 PM

Ring the press office! Just get the contact number from the website and ask them to see whether they have a copy of the inflight magazine for your journey time. They can then check the channel listing, or you might even be able to find it yourself via google or something?

starspinners May 12th, 2003 06:27 AM

Hi ChrisCal,
I CAN believe that you are obsessing over a song. :-)
I know what's it's like to have an elusive lyric fragment or a bit of melody floating in my head!
I wonder if this is the song that you heard on your BA flight: "Sacris Solemnis" from the CD entitled Luminosa?
You can listen to a sound clip of this selection on amazon.com to see if it is the right one.
Good luck in your hunt.

ChrisCal May 12th, 2003 07:47 AM

Nigel, I had already contacted BA by email and they had given me the name of 2 CDs, neither of which had the song.
Starspinners: Yes! that's it! Thankyou, thankyou. I think part of the reason I was so obsessed with it was that we had a fabulous trip, easy flights and you know how songs evoke a time and place... I can't believe the album does not credit Beethoven as it is so obviously a vocal version of the 2nd movement of his 7th symphony, which is one of my favorites (the scene in Immortal Beloved using it is wonderful) Thanks again for taking the time to respond to my plea for help. Chris

starspinners May 13th, 2003 04:39 PM

Hi again Chris,
I'm glad you found your song.
You are so right about how music can send the mind reminiscing. :-)

Christina May 13th, 2003 07:17 PM

I think it does state it's the Allegretto from that symphony. That's their thing to do songs taken from classical music.

http://www.warnerclassics.com/libera/

ChrisCal May 13th, 2003 08:31 PM

Christina, you are right. After reading reviews of the album it was clear that he does remakes of classical pieces. It would have been nice if it had been referenced that way in terms of doing a search.

artlover May 13th, 2003 09:02 PM

I can't believe this...I too was obssessing on British Airways music, but it when I was on hold for over 2 hours getting tickets when they had their big sale a few months back. I loved the music so much, I didn't even mind being on hold (put on the speaker phone).

So I told my husband (who is a musician/composer & big classical & opera fan) about it and called British Air back so that he could hear it and tell me what it was, and would you believe it--we got put right through to an agent! The agent didn't know what the music is and when I was put on hold another time, my husband wasn't sure either.

Anyone out there know?

Franto May 13th, 2003 09:24 PM

A little bit of detective work: try to get a hold of the inflight magazine for the time period in which you traveled. The music selections should be there. Go to the BA website and look for merchandising or something, they must have a place where they keep back copies of the magazines. Hunt from there. Good Luck!

ChrisCal May 13th, 2003 09:45 PM

Artlover, you gave me quite a laugh. It makes me feel better that I am not the only one out there who does this. It drives me crazy when I hear something on the radio, wait for the DJ to give info and they never do!
Anyway, regarding your plight. I wonder if it was the same music they played on the plane. The station I got hooked on while flying played an album called Classical Chillout which had some well known classical pieces: O Mio Bambino Caro, Lark Ascending, Flower Duet, etc but was mixed up with some new age versions, including 2 they use as ads. Before I thought to post my question here, which was amazingly answered with the song I was looking for by Starspinners (a group called Lumiere which is a boys choir doing new age renditions of classical pieces) I had emailed BA. You can go right on their site and look for the "contact us" link. I posed my question (sounding demented, I am sure... other people are worried about security and terrorism these days) and they did personally respond to me but it took almost 2 weeks. So, I would try that and ask for the name of the music they play on tapes while you are waiting on hold. Hopefully it is not a live radio station, which you could not track. In that case, I would imagine you would have heard some ads. Good luck, let me know of your progress.

ChrisCal May 13th, 2003 10:34 PM

Artlover, here is a link to the amazon site with the classical chillout album. You can play audio clips of a few of the tracks and see if it is anything like the music you were hearing. It speaks to the power of music or the brillance of BA that the music calmed us both enough to tolerate being put on hold for 2 hours and sit on a plane for 10 hours!
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg...c&n=507846

artlover May 14th, 2003 07:15 PM

Thanks ChrisCal for the information, but I wasn't able to get the demo music (but if my husband ever has time I'll see if he can get it on his computer--it's faster than mine.) I did e-mail British Air with the question and so far received a generic reply that they received my e-mail, but since this is hardly urgent, I'll wait and see and let you know when I find out anything.

You're right, it is quite a testimony to the power of music that we can deal with the waiting and long flights and still want to travel. Or perhaps it's more a testimony to the magic of Europe!

Katherine May 14th, 2003 09:12 PM

Hi Chris. There is a song in which Malcolm McLaren and Yanni collaborated it is called Aria and it is on Yanni's "Dare to Dream" CD. I am not sure if this is what you were looking for. I hope this helps.

squeaky88th May 15th, 2003 12:47 AM

Chris - I discover new music this way all the time. I found a great CD due to a Virgin Atlantic flight to London.

I obssessed over a very upbeat, hip top tango tune I heard and eventually discovered it was by Gotan Project. I have listened to the CD dozens of times through and am still not tired of it.

Unfortunately, I have still yet to find the original artists responsible for many, many tunes I heard playing in concerts (intermission), TV shows and commercials. Oh well.

I remember there was a time when you found new musical artists via the radio. That's not the case anymore.


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