After more than a decade in relative obscurity, Argentina-born crooner Semino Rossi emerged as one of the biggest singing stars in Central Europe. Born in Rosario, Argentina, on May 29, 1962, Rossi arrived in Austria in 1986, working as a hotel singer. In the years to follow he spent the summer months in Spain and the winter season in Austria, eventually settling full-time in Innsbruck. There Rossi joined the Worldmasters für Lateinamerikanische Tänze in 1995, culminating in 2001 when he was crowned Weltmeister in Lateinamerikanischer Musik at the world championship in Japan. That same year Rossi signed to Universal, in 2004 releasing his first German-language LP, Alles Aus Liebe. Tausend Rosen für Dich followed a year later, climbing into the German Top Ten and solidifying Rossi's growing stature. He closed out 2005 with a holiday album, Feliz Navidad. With 2006's Ich Denk an Dich Rossi enjoyed his greatest success to date, winning the ECHO and the Amadeus Austrian Music Award.

 

Andrea Berg was one of the biggest-selling German pop divas of her generation, winning three consecutive ECHO awards for her commercial prowess. Born January 28, 1966, in Krefeld, Berg was discovered in 1992 by producer/svengali Eugen Römer, who ushered her into the studio within a week of signing. Her debut LP, Du Bist Frei, quickly followed, and while sales were poor, the follow-up, Gefühle, proved a massive hit, led by the smash single "Die Gefühle Haben Schweigepflicht." The 1997 release Träume Lügen Nicht solidified Berg's chart success, and after a hiatus heralded by the impending birth of her first child, she resurfaced in 1999 with Weil Ich Verliebt Bin. Two years later Berg issued her first Best Of collection, a blockbuster hit that spent more than four consecutive years on the German charts and earned her the first of her ECHO prizes. Her next studio LP, Machtlos, also reached number one upon its mid-2003 release. In 2006, Berg returned with Splitternackt.

 

Jean-Michel André Jarre was born 24 August 1948 and is a French composer, performer and music producer. He is a pioneer in the electronic, synthpop, ambient and New Age genres, and known as an organiser of outdoor spectacles of his music featuring lights, laser displays, and fireworks. Jarre was raised in Lyon by his mother and grandparents, and trained on the piano. From an early age he was introduced to a variety of art forms, including those of street performers, jazz musicians, and the artist Pierre Soulages. He played guitar in a band, but his musical style was perhaps most heavily influenced by Pierre Schaeffer, a pioneer of musique concrète at the Groupe de Recherches Musicales. His first mainstream success was the 1976 album Oxygène. Recorded in a makeshift studio at his home, the album sold an estimated 12 million copies. Oxygène was followed in 1978 by Équinoxe, and in 1979 Jarre performed to a record-breaking audience of more than a million people at the Place de la Concorde, a record he has since broken three times. More albums were to follow, but his 1979 concert served as a blueprint for his future performances around the world. Several of his albums have been released to coincide with large-scale outdoor events, and he is now perhaps as well known as a performer as a musician. Jarre has sold an estimated 80 million albums and singles. He was the first Western musician to be allowed to perform in the People's Republic of China, and holds the world record for the largest-ever audience at an outdoor event.

 

Eagles (often referred to as "The Eagles") is an American rock band formed in Los Angeles, California during the early 1970s. The group chose the name Eagles as a nod to The Byrds (as founding member Bernie Leadon had been in Dillard & Clark with former Byrds singer Gene Clark and in The Flying Burrito Brothers with former Byrds Gram Parsons, Chris Hillman, and Michael Clarke). Steve Martin records in his autobiography, Born Standing Up, that Frey was very particular that the name was Eagles and not The Eagles. The band played initially as Linda Ronstadt?s backing group. With five #1 singles and six #1 albums, Eagles was one of the most successful recording artists of the 1970s. At the end of the 20th century, two of their albums, Eagles: Their Greatest Hits 1971?1975 and Hotel California, ranked among the 20 best-selling albums according to the Recording Industry Association of America. The best-selling studio album Hotel California is rated as the 37th album in the Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time, and the band was ranked #75 on the magazine's 2004 list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time. They also have the best selling album in the U.S. to date with Eagles: Their Greatest Hits 1971?1975. The Eagles broke up in 1980, but reunited in 1994 for Hell Freezes Over, a mix of live and new studio tracks. They have toured intermittently since then, and were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1998. In 2007, Eagles released Long Road out of Eden, their first full studio album in 28 years. The next year they launched The Long Road out of Eden Tour in support of their album. The tour continued on into 2009, crossing North America and Europe, with its last date on , 2009 in Lisbon, Portugal.

 

Neil Leslie Diamond (born January 24, 1941) is an American singer-songwriter. As a successful pop music performer, Diamond scored a number of hits worldwide in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s. According to David Wild, common themes in Diamond's songs are "a deep sense of isolation and an equal desire for connection. A yearning for home – and at the same time, the allure of greater freedom. The good, the bad and the ugly about a crazy little thing called love." As of 2001 Diamond has 115 million records sold worldwide, including 48 million records in the U.S. In terms of Billboard chart success, he is the third most successful Adult Contemporary artist ever, ranking behind only Barbra Streisand and Elton John. Though his record sales declined somewhat after the 1980s, Diamond continues to tour successfully, and maintains a very loyal following. Diamond's songs have been recorded by a vast array of performers from many different musical genres. Diamond was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1984, and in 2000 he received the Sammy Cahn Lifetime Achievement Award. On Monday, March 14, 2011, Neil Diamond was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

 

Yusuf Islam was born as Steven Demetre Georgiou on 21 July 1948, in Marylebone, London, England, originally and commonly known by his former stage name Cat Stevens, is an English musician. He is a singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, educator, philanthropist, and prominent convert to Islam. His early 1970s record albums Tea for the Tillerman and Teaser and the Firecat were both certified as Triple Platinum by the RIAA in the United States; his 1972 album Catch Bull at Four sold half a million copies in the first two weeks of release alone and was Billboard's number-one LP for three consecutive weeks. He has also earned two ASCAP songwriting awards in consecutive years for "The First Cut Is the Deepest", which has been a hit single for four different artists. Stevens converted to Islam in December 1977 and adopted his Muslim name, Yusuf Islam, the following year. In 1979, he auctioned all his guitars for charity and left his music career to devote himself to educational and philanthropic causes in the Muslim community. He has been given several awards for his work in promoting peace in the world, including 2003's World Award, the 2004 Man for Peace Award, and the 2007 Mediterranean Prize for Peace. In 2006, he returned to pop music with his first album of new pop songs in 28 years, entitled An Other Cup. He now goes professionally by the single name Yusuf. His newest album, Roadsinger, was released on 5 May 2009.

 

James Blunt is an English singer-songwriter and musician, and former army officer, whose debut album, Back to Bedlam and single releases, including "You're Beautiful" and "Goodbye My Lover", brought him to fame in 2005. His repertoire can be best described as a mix of acoustic-tinged pop, rock and folk. After recording on the independent American label Custard Records, Blunt won two BRIT Awards, two Ivor Novello Awards, and by 2006 was nominated for five Grammy Awards. The following year, he released his second album All the Lost Souls (2007). Blunt's third studio album, Some Kind of Trouble, was released in November 2010. Worldwide, Blunt has sold over 15 million albums.

 

Jamiroquai is a British jazz funk and acid jazz band formed in 1992. Jamiroquai were initially the most prominent component in the early-1990s London-based acid jazz movement, alongside groups such as Incognito, the James Taylor Quartet, the Brand New Heavies, Galliano, and Corduroy. Subsequent albums have explored other musical directions such as pop, rock and electronica. Jamiroquai have sold more than 25 million albums worldwide and won a Grammy Award in 1997.

 

James Last (born Hans Last on April 17, 1929 in Bremen) is a German composer and big band leader with a large fan base in Europe and world-wide. Last’s trademark is arranging pop hits in a big-band style; his series of “party albums” is equally well-known. Over the course of his career, he has sold well over 100 million albums.