"Barbra's not interested in repeating what has been done by so many artists before her," he says. Landers, her collaborator for 15 years, says they scoured their record collections and tapped select songwriters for input. She still hits the notes she was hitting 40 years ago." Consequently, it's a breathtakingly gorgeous album from beginning to end. I want songs that are meaningful to me.' As always, she had a definite vision and stuck with it. She said, quite rightly, 'Everybody does that. "I said she should be doing familiar songs that people want to hear. "We debated about the direction of this album," says David Foster, who produced her version of Grown-Up Christmas List, which he co-wrote with wife Linda Thompson. She bought it for $1.95 in a supermarket. Maybe I should watch my diet.' I'm still in that state of confusion."Ĭhristmas Memories, recorded primarily with a 90-piece orchestra, offers an unorthodox selection, including Stephen Sondheim's retooled I Remember, originally a non-holiday tune penned for TV musical Evening Primrose, and the obscure One God, which Streisand first heard at 16 on a Johnny Mathis album, 1958's Good Night, Dear Lord. I don't care about my weight.' The next day, my optimistic side takes over and I think, 'Wait a minute, life goes on, people will get wiser, justice will prevail. hamburger and eating fried chicken three nights in a row. She relates, "One day I tell myself, 'Screw everything, I'm getting a Carl's Jr. 11, her shock turned to uncertainty in matters both grave and trivial. The last words I wrote were for Closer, and they in a way became my sister's epitaph."Īs Streisand groped for equilibrium after Sept. 11 and said, "For the first time in my life, no words come to me. Jay Landers, who produced the album with Streisand, says the lyricist called him with the dreadful news on Sept. In a sad postscript, Pitchford lost his sister in the World Trade Center atrocities. "I'm singing Closer about Stephan, but I was hoping it could relate to anyone who's lost someone." "Stephan was a dear friend, an incredibly gifted sculptor, a great businessman and a wonderful human being who knew how to laugh," Streisand recalls. After Weiss died of lung cancer on June 10, Streisand asked Pitchford to tailor the lyrics to reflect the loss of a loved one rather than a yearning to rekindle romance at Christmas. Streisand and hubby James Brolin spent last Christmas with the couple. 30, expresses that notion most dramatically in Closer, a song by Dean Pitchford and Tom Snow that Streisand dedicates to Stephan Weiss, late husband of designer Donna Karan. You realize you have to live every day, every moment with the understanding of how fragile life is."Ĭhristmas Memories, released Oct. I was so touched by the outpouring of human kindness and compassion, the basis of every great religion. But that tragedy brought out the best in people. "And then, oh, my God, it's here, this nightmare, this horror. "I can't explain it, but I had a feeling something was coming," Streisand, 59, says by phone from her home in Malibu, Calif. Streisand is no psychic, but she long sensed a coming catastrophe, and that apprehension may have cultivated the album's spiritual tone and quest for harmony. 11, Christmas Memories attained profound, and even prophetic, shadings in the wake of the terror attacks. Like U2's All That You Can't Leave Behind, Enya's A Day Without Rain and other uplifting music released before Sept. 7, she was satisfied that the album echoed depth and drama that went beyond a cozy celebration of the holiday season.įour days later, those sentiments of love, friendship and selflessness took on an even broader reach. When Barbra Streisand finished recording Christmas Memories on Sept. Streisand's Christmas offering December 12, 2001
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