Harry Connick Jr’s newest album Your Songs takes you back to another place and time. The album is a mix of classic songs from the “good ole days.” Like his previous album, Your Songs is full of Harry Connick Jr. singing known songs with a Jazz big band and a string orchestra. For this spectacular album, he teamed up with the legendary Clive Davis.

While, this isn’t my typical genre of music, I enjoyed relaxing to these songs. Of course, it really adds to the music when you can visualize Harry Connick Jr. too! He is most known to me from his time on Will & Grace. He has a wide array of skill sets beyond acting – singer, composer, pianist, philantropist, husband, and father – he is THE complete package!

My favorite songs are Can’t Help Falling in Love With You and  The Way You Look Tonight.

Here’s a full track list:

• All The Way (Frank Sinatra)
• Just The Way You Are (Billy Joel)
• Can’t Help Falling In Love With You (Elvis Presley)
• And I Love Her (The Beatles)
• (They Long To Be) Close To You (The Carpenters)
• Besame Mucho
• The Way You Look Tonight
• First Time Ever I Saw Your Face (Roberta Flack)
• Your Song (Elton John)
• Some Enchanted Evening
• And I Love You So (Don McLean)
• Who Can I Turn To? (Tony Bennett)
• Smile (Charlie Chaplin)
• Mona Lisa (Nat King Cole)

I think Harry Connick Jr. fans and new fans alike will enjoy this relaxing album!

Bargain Briana Disclosure: One to One Network provided me with this CD.  All reviews/recommendations are based on my thoughts/opinions and are not edited or written by the sponsor.

Stay tuned for a great new family album from Kenny Loggins called All Join In! You may know Kenny Loggins from his rock hits from popular soundtracks like Footloose, Caddyshack, and Top Gun. You may not know that he was the first major rock star to dedicate himself to recording music for children. His first album, Return to Pooh Corner, has been a best selling children’s album for over 20 years.

Your entire family will enjoy the new CD, All Join in! The track “There is a Mountain” is available for download on iTunes. You can also enjoy the YouTube video. The music is one that the entire family will enjoy as it is not overly childish but is still relevant for a child.

Includes tracks:

1. Underneath the Same Sky
2. All Together Now
3. You’ve Got a Friend in Me
4. Two of Us
5. Come Go With Me
6. There Is a Mountain
7. The Puppy Song
8. You Can All Join In
9. Gandhi/Buddha
10. Long Tailed Cat
11. Your Lollipop
12. Moose ‘n Me
13. 1234

Be sure to download four of the new songs for FREE before they are released!

Thanks to the One to One Network for allowing me to preview this CD!

I can’t believe I haven’t shared this with you here at the Buzz before! But I have told you how much I ♥ Chris Mann? If you followed me on facebook or twitter, you probably would have “heard” me drooling over him. Not only does he have a beautiful face, he has a beautiful voice and a beautiful ♥. Okay, so the truth is he complimented my shirt.

I was first introduced to him at the Blissdom Conference I went to in Nashville this past February. We were treated to a private concert as well as get our pictures taken with him!  I was so nervous to meet him even though I didn’t know of him before I attended but he has an amazingly great demeanor with all of stalkers fans. Or soon to be stalkers. Chris says healthy stalking is good. After this blog post, he may reconsider his stance on my “healthy” stalking! Though, I am mentioned on HIS blog so maybe it is the other way around.

No, it is probably me being the stalker. I’ve even contacted the Indianapolis Colts to see if they will invite him to be a anthem singer. How awesome would that be to have Chris Mann sing the anthem at a Colts game!? Not that I have any pull besides stalking the Manning brothers…I’m probably on some kind of list…oh no, is anyone seeing a theme here? Chris Mann, Peyton MANNing, Eli MANNing….

So anyway, onto the stuff about Chris Mann’s mind blowing talent. Chris Mann has a soulful rendition of Kayne West’s Heartless on Youtube. You must check it out. I was already a fan of the song but I love his unique twist on it with his beautiful vocals. Even better, Chris interacted with his #mannfans and asked them to submit their heartbreak words. Some included photos and he has included them in his video! Every time I listen to it, it gives me chills.

A few tunes will be released shortly on iTunes and he will have a CD out soon too. Of course,  I will alert you when it is out. But for now, you will just to enjoy the wonder that is Chris Mann on Youtube.

While I’m a huge fan of pop music, I don’t watch Dancing With the Stars. So starting this review with a clean slate as  I have never heard of any of the people in the Ballas Hough Band. For those not in the know, Mark Ballas and Derek Hough are two fan favorite ball room dancers on the popular television show.  In addition to Ballas and Hough, Emily Grace on keyboards and vocals, bassist Sam Marder and drummer Harry Sullivan.

My favorite catchy songs on the Ballas Hough Band self titled CD are the first three a “Do You Love Me,” “Devastated”, Closer. I love the tune of Devastated as it makes me want to get up and dance much to my kid’s chagrin. Devastated has a Maroon 5 flavor as the Ballas Hough Band worked with Eric Valentine who produced the All American Reject’s lastest album. “Birthday” seems to be a retro track and has a 70ish feel to it.

“She was the One” has a good beat but I don’t care for the solo vocals on this track it seems too plain when it is solo. I do like it when the entire group is singing on this song.  If you like slower songs, you will like “Longing For” and “Underwater.”

I’m really enjoying listening to the music on this soundtrack. While some may say it is for a younger set, I’m 30 and love to listen to the “younger” sounding music. It may be because it makes me feel young!

(Thanks to the One 2 One Network for the chance to review this soundtrack!)

While R&B/soul isn’t my first choice of music, I enjoyed listening to Corneille: The Birth of Cornelius. It is very a very soothing R&B acoustic sound. Soulful and soothing, you will enjoy listening to songs like “Back to My Life,” “All of My Love,” and “Home is by You.”

“Music has been the place where I could go to hide and forget about the world. I couldn’t make sense of a majority of the things that happened to me, so I used music as a shield. But over time, music has become a vehicle to channel out everything that I’ve been keeping from myself for all these years. And the new album is definitely the most honest, real assessment of everything that’s happened in my life, because I’m not trying to hide as much.”—Corneille

New to Motown Records, Corneille is not new to music. Selling out concerts and reaching diamond selling status in France, this musician has persevered throughout many personal struggles. Born in German, at age six returned to his parent’s native country of Rwanda. Encouraged by his parents to embrace his love of music, he won a state sponsored music competition at age 16.

This joy would not last for long. In 1994, Rwanda’s President was assassinated and a genocide began, which claimed more  800,000 lives including Corneille’s parents as well as other family members. Corneille was able to escape to Germany and he is filled with wonderful memories of love from his parents.This all makes his music even more intriguing. Corneille is a special person who has been able to take a horrific tragedy and make something beautiful from it.

This is what I love about reviewing music. I get to test out genres I would have never tried on my own. Thanks Team Mom Music for the opportunity to try out this wonderful music!

My husband surprised me with Darius Rucker tickets. I was like “Darius Who?” He then hummed a tune that I recognized. Okay, cool. It was at the Honeywell Center in Wabash, Indiana, which is a place I’ve never been.

So we started out eating dinner at Eugenia’s Restaurant. We made reservations the previous week and were taken to the very back room. As we were walking through, I saw empty beautiful comfortable chairs in the first two rooms but we were stuck in the back room with just plastic chairs. Not sure who you have to know to get in the comfy chair area! Let’s not focus on that, though. Service was great and the food was wonderful. I’m not usually a buffet person but this was one of those nice buffets – not food that had been sitting there all day.

So after filling our bellies, it was time to head to the concert. We were immediately impressed with the venue. Large enough but small enough to feel intimate.  We were in the lower level and had a wonderful view besides ya know, the tall guy that sat right in front of us short gals!  You can see our view with their cool seat viewer.

First up was someone I had never heard of Jason Jones. His music is more of the new school country which I enjoy. My dad wondered if he was going to sing another song about a gravel road. One cool thing he mentioned was Twitter – @jonesville. I know 90% of the people in the audience where like “Twitter What?” My parents included but my mom had heard of Twitter because I talk about it all the time.

Jason Jones is entertaining, energetic, and loads of fun! There was a “crazy fan” in the audience yelling stuff out and Jason replied, “I don’t know what you are saying but I like it!” He is very approachable as most upcoming musicians. You listen to his music at myspace.com/jonesville. A few of my favorites: A Place Down in Georgia, Hard Rain, and  Walk on Me. P.S. Myspace music doesn’t do him justice!

Then it was onto the main act, Darius Rucker. While listening to his first song, my mom leans over and says she thinks he sounds like Hootie. I said, yeah, a little. As we continue to listen to his songs, he played a Hootie song and then the light bulb went off. I finally put it together. Darius Rucker = Hootie. No wonder people were yelling something that sounded an awfully like Hootie.

Rucker put on an AWESOME show playing new songs, old songs, and songs “He wished he had written.” We even had his rendition of Purple Rain for the final song.  He has such a wide range of music he is able to play. Of course, “Don’t Think I Don’t Think About It” and “It Won’t Be Like This For Long” were great crowd movers. Bringing back the Hootie songs conjured high school memories for me and got people off their feet with their cell phones swaying  songs like “Let Her Cry” and “Only Want To Be With You.”

A few other thoughts about the Honeywell Centers: Intimate atmosphere, free parking, and cheap drinks. For us, it is a few more miles than say Deer Creek Music Center in Noblesville but we were able to get in and out of the venue much quicker at the Honeywell Center.

Thanks to the One2One Network, bloggers at the Blissdom Conference were able to get a sneak peek at Yanni Voices Live in Concert before it aired on March 2nd on PBS. You can see a complete show listing here. We even had a special treat when Yanni and Ender showed up LIVE. Let me say, I am loving Ender’s current hair style – short. Both are adorable and knew how to work a room of women by giving credit to their mothers!

While this is not my normal type of music, it was very entertaining and enjoyable. The voices are great. The kids are adorable. You will hear Yanni put VOICES to his music for the first time. Check out a sneak peek at www.yanni.com/Events/

Follow along with the tweets to see exactly what we were saying at Blissdom!

Looking for some fun music for your kids but don’t want something that will drive you insane? Enter, MilkShake. (Note if you click the link, music will start playing. You will enjoy but wanted to warn you if you are work, kids are napping, etc.) Milkshake was created in 2002, by lead singer Lisa Mathews, and guitarist Mikel Gehl after they began writing songs inspired by their own children.

Behind the catchy tunes and memorable songs, there is a rock band playing. Milkshake’s most recent CD, Play, celebrates every child’s desire to have fun. It covers every area a kid could love, from baseball, bowling, pretending, playing music, parades, planting a garden, and just going wild (my kid’s favorite!).

Milkshake also goes on tour! They may be coming to a city near you. The performances are a top draw and kids come to the shows with toys and handmade instruments while getting caught up in Milkshake-mania! Don’t you love Lisa’s tutu? What little girl doesn’t love wearing one of her own!

We’ve been listening to this CD and watching their new DVD, Screenplay, most mornings on the way to work. I find myself still listening even after dropping the kiddos off! You will want to watch the bonus videos on this DVD.

So head on over to Milkshakemusic.com, listen to some samplings, and learn more about this band.

If you’re a fan of Celine Dion or just love great live entertainment, check out Celine’s Taking Chances World Tour. Her North American tour dates have been extended into February ’09 so take a look and see if she’s coming to your town. Celine’s concert tickets may just be the perfect gift for a friend, family member or yourself. See what the show is like here.

If you’re a fan of Celine Dion or just love great live entertainment, check out Celine’s Taking Chances World Tour. Her North American tour dates have been extended into February ’09 so take a look and see if she’s coming to your town. Celine’s concert tickets may just be the perfect gift for a friend, family member or yourself. See what the show is like here. (She’s going to be in Indy on Sunday, December 21st – no Colts game so check it out!)