Name	Compact disc
Logo
Caption	The readable surface of a Compact Disc includes a spiral track wound tightly enough to cause light to diffract into a full visible spectrum
Type	Optical disc
Encoding	Various
Capacity	Typically up to 700 MB (up to 80 minutes audio)
Read	780 nm wavelength semiconductor laser, 1200 Kb/s (1×)
Write	1200 Kb/s (1×)
Owner	Philips, Sony
Use	Audio and data storage

A Compact Disc (also known as a CD) is an optical disc used to store digital data. It was originally developed to store and playback sound recordings exclusively, but later expanded to encompass data storage CD-ROM, write-once audio and data storage CD-R, rewritable media CD-RW, Video Compact Discs (VCD), Super Video Compact Discs (SVCD), PhotoCD, PictureCD, CD-i, and Enhanced CD. Audio CDs have been commercially available since October 1982.

Standard CDs have a diameter of 120 mm and can hold up to 80 minutes of uncompressed audio (700 MB of data). The Mini CD has various diameters ranging from 60 to 80 mm; they are sometimes used for CD singles, storing up to 24 minutes of audio or delivering device drivers.

CD-ROMs and CD-Rs remain widely used technologies in the computer industry. The CD and its extensions are successful: in 2004, worldwide sales of CD audio, CD-ROM, and CD-R reached about 30 billion discs. By 2007, 200 billion CDs had been sold worldwide. In , compact discs have been largely replaced by other forms of digital storage such as flash drives, with audio CD sales dropping nearly 50% from their peak in 2000.

History

The Compact Disc is a spin-off of Laserdisc technology. Sony first publicly demonstrated an optical digital audio disc in September 1976. In September 1978 they demonstrated an optical digital audio disc with a 150 minute playing time, and with specifications of 44,056 Hz sampling rate, 16-bit linear resolution, cross-interleaved error correction code, that were similar to those of the Compact Disc introduced in 1982. Technical details of Sony's digital audio disc were presented during the 62nd AES Convention, held on March 13–16, 1979, in Brussels. On March 8, 1979 Philips publicly demonstrated a prototype of an optical digital audio disc at a press conference called "Philips Introduce Compact Disc" in Eindhoven, Netherlands. On March 6, 2009, Philips received an IEEE Milestone with the following citation: "On 8 March 1979, N.V. Philips' Gloeilampenfabrieken demonstrated for the international press a Compact Disc Audio Player. The demonstration showed that it is possible by using digital optical recording and playback to reproduce audio signals with superb stereo quality. This research at Philips established the technical standard for digital optical recording systems."

Later in 1979, Sony and Philips Consumer Electronics (Philips) set up a joint task force of engineers to design a new digital audio disc. Led by Kees Schouhamer Immink and Toshitada Doi, the research pushed forward laser and optical disc technology that began independently by Philips and Sony in 1977 and 1975, respectively. told by a former member of the taskforce, gives background information on the many technical decisions made, including the choice of the sampling frequency, playing time, and disc diameter. The taskforce consisted of around four to eight persons, though according to Philips, the Compact Disc was thus "invented collectively by a large group of people working as a team."

The first test CD was pressed in Langenhagen near Hannover, Germany, by the Polydor Pressing Operations plant. The disc contained a recording of Richard Strauss's Eine Alpensinfonie (in English language, An Alpine Symphony), played by the Berlin Philharmonic and conducted by Herbert von Karajan. The first public demonstration was on the BBC television program Tomorrow's World when The Bee Gees' album Living Eyes (1981) was played. In August 1982 the real pressing was ready to begin in the new factory, not far from the place where Emil Berliner had produced his first gramophone record 93 years earlier. By now, Deutsche Grammophon, Berliner's company and the publisher of the Strauss recording, had become a part of PolyGram. The first CD to be manufactured at the new factory was The Visitors (1981) by ABBA. The first album to be released on CD was Billy Joel's 52nd Street, that reached the market alongside Sony's CD player CDP-101 on October 1, 1982 in Japan. Early the following year on March 2, 1983 CD players and discs (16 titles from CBS Records) were released in the United States and other markets. This event is often seen as the "Big Bang" of the digital audio revolution. The new audio disc was enthusiastically received, especially in the early-adopting classical music and audiophile communities and its handling quality received particular praise. As the price of players gradually came down, the CD began to gain popularity in the larger popular and rock music markets. The first artist to sell a million copies on CD was Dire Straits, with its 1985 album Brothers in Arms. The first major artist to have his entire catalogue converted to CD was David Bowie, whose 15 studio albums were made available by RCA Records in February 1985, along with four Greatest Hits albums. In 1988, 400 million CDs were manufactured by 50 pressing plants around the world.

The CD was planned to be the successor of the gramophone record for playing music, rather than primarily as a data storage medium. From its origins as a musical format, CDs have grown to encompass other applications. In June 1985, the computer readable CD-ROM (read-only memory) and, in 1990, CD-Recordable were introduced, also developed by both Sony and Philips. The CD's compact format has largely replaced the audio cassette player in new automobile applications, and recordable CDs are an alternative to tape for recording music and copying music albums without defects introduced in compression used in other digital recording methods. Other newer video formats such as DVD and Blu-ray have used the same form factor as CDs, and video players can usually play audio CDs as well. With the advent of the MP3 in the 2000s, the sales of CDs has dropped in seven out of the last eight years. In 2008, large label CD sales dropped 20%, although independent and DIY music sales may be tracking better according to figures released March 30, 2009.

Physical details

A CD is made from 1.2 mm thick (.047 inches), almost-pure polycarbonate plastic and weighs 15–20 grams. From the center outward, components are: the center (spindle) hole, the first-transition area (clamping ring), the clamping area (stacking ring), the second-transition area (mirror band), the information (data) area, and the rim.

A thin layer of aluminium or, more rarely, gold is applied to the surface making it reflective. The metal is protected by a film of lacquer normally spin coated directly on the reflective layer. The label is printed on the lacquer layer. Common printing methods for CDs are screen-printing and offset printing.

CD data are stored as a series of tiny indentations known as "pits", encoded in a spiral track moulded into the top of the polycarbonate layer. The areas between pits are known as "lands". Each pit is approximately 100 nm deep by 500 nm wide, and varies from 850 nm to 3.5 µm in length.

The distance between the tracks, the pitch, is 1.6 µm. A CD is read by focusing a 780 nm wavelength (near infrared) semiconductor laser through the bottom of the polycarbonate layer. The change in height between pits (actually ridges as seen by the laser) and lands results in a difference in intensity in the light reflected. By measuring the intensity change with a photodiode, the data can be read from the disc.

The pits and lands themselves do not directly represent the zeros and ones of binary data. Instead, Non-return-to-zero, inverted (NRZI) encoding is used: a change from pit to land or land to pit indicates a one, while no change indicates a series of zeros. There must be at least two and no more than ten zeros between each one, which is defined by the length of the pit. This in turn is decoded by reversing the eight-to-fourteen modulation used in mastering the disc, and then reversing the Cross-Interleaved Reed-Solomon Coding, finally revealing the raw data stored on the disc.

CDs are susceptible to damage from both normal use and environmental exposure. Pits are much closer to the label side of a disc, enabling defects and contaminants on the clear side to be out of focus during playback. Consequently, CDs are more likely to suffer damage on the label side of the disk. Scratches on the clear side can be repaired by refilling them with similar refractive plastic, or by careful polishing.

Disc shapes and diameters

The digital data on a CD begins at the center of the disc and proceeds toward the edge, which allows adaptation to the different size formats available. Standard CDs are available in two sizes. By far, the most common is 120 mm in diameter, with a 74- or 80-minute audio capacity and a 650 or 700 MB data capacity. This diameter has been adopted by subsequent formats, including Super Audio CD, DVD, HD DVD, and Blu-ray Disc. 80 mm discs ("Mini CDs") were originally designed for CD singles and can hold up to 24 minutes of music or 210 MB of data but never became popular. Today, nearly every single is released on a 120 mm CD, called a Maxi single.

Novelty CDs are also available in numerous shapes and sizes, and are used chiefly for marketing. A common variant is the "business card" CD, a single with portions removed at the top and bottom making the disk resemble a business card.

Logical formats

Audio CD

The logical format of an audio CD (officially Compact Disc Digital Audio or CD-DA) is described in a document produced by the format's joint creators, Sony and Philips in 1980. The document is known colloquially as the "Red Book" after the color of its cover. The format is a two-channel 16-bit PCM encoding at a 44.1 kHz sampling rate per channel. Four-channel sound is an allowable option within the Red Book format, but has never been implemented. Monaural audio has no existing standard on a Red Book CD; mono-source material is usually presented as two identical channels on a 'stereo' track.

44.1 kHz sample rate

The selection of the sample rate was based primarily on the need to reproduce the audible frequency range of 20 Hz - 20 kHz. The Nyquist–Shannon sampling theorem states that a sampling rate of more than twice the maximum frequency of the signal to be recorded is needed, resulting in a required rate of at least 40 kHz. The exact sampling rate of 44.1 kHz was inherited from a method of converting digital audio into an analog video signal for storage on U-matic video tape, which was the most affordable way to transfer data from the recording studio to the CD manufacturer at the time the CD specification was being developed. The device that converts an analog audio signal into PCM audio, which in turn is changed into an analog video signal is called a PCM adaptor. This technology could store six samples (three samples per stereo channel) in a single horizontal line. A standard NTSC video signal has 245 usable lines per field, and 59.94 fields/s, which works out to be 44,056 samples/s/stereo channel. Similarly, PAL has 294 lines and 50 fields, which gives 44,100 samples/s/stereo channel. This system could store 14-bit samples with some error correction, or 16-bit samples with almost no error correction.

There was a long debate over the use of 14-bit (Philips) or 16-bit (Sony) quantization, and 44,056 or 44,100 samples/s (Sony) or approximately 44,000 samples/s (Philips). When the Sony/Philips task force designed the Compact Disc, Philips had already developed a 14-bit D/A converter, but Sony insisted on 16-bit. In the end, 16 bits and 44.1 kilosamples per second prevailed. Philips found a way to produce 16-bit quality using its 14-bit DAC by using four times oversampling.

Storage capacity and playing time

The partners aimed at a playing time of 60 minutes with a disc diameter of 100 mm (Sony) or 115 mm (Philips).

The additional 14-minute playing time subsequently required changing to a 120 mm disc. Kees Immink, Philips' chief engineer, however, denies this, claiming that the increase was motivated by technical considerations, and that even after the increase in size, the Furtwängler recording would not have fit on one of the earliest CDs. the story is slightly more involved. In 1979, Philips owned PolyGram, one of the world's largest distributors of music. PolyGram had set up a large experimental CD plant in Hannover, Germany, which could produce huge numbers of CDs having, of course, a diameter of 115 mm. Sony did not yet have such a facility. If Sony had agreed on the 115-mm disc, Philips would have had a significant competitive edge in the market. Sony decided that something had to be done. The long playing time of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony imposed by Ōga was used to push Philips to accept 120 mm, so that Philips' PolyGram lost its edge on disc fabrication. typical of long-playing (LP) vinyl albums, was often used to the CD's advantage during the early years when CDs and LPs vied for commercial sales. CDs would often be released with one or more bonus tracks, enticing consumers to buy the CD for the extra material. However, attempts to combine double LPs onto one CD occasionally resulted in the opposite situation in which the CD would actually offer fewer tracks than the equivalent LP.

Playing times beyond 74 minutes are achieved by increasing track pitch beyond the original red book standard. Most players can accommodate the more closely spaced data. The Kirov Orchestra recording of Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's The Nutcracker conducted by Valery Gergiev and released by Philips/PolyGram Records (catalogue number 462 114) on October 20, 1998, clocks at 81:14. Disc two of Gold (Deutche Grammophon/Universal Classics 477 743) by Herbert von Karajan clocks in at 81:21. The Mission of Burma compilation album Mission of Burma, released in 1988 by Rykodisc, previously held the record at 80:08.

Main physical parameters

The main parameters of the CD (taken from the September 1983 issue of the Red Book) are as follows:

Scanning velocity: 1.2–1.4 m/s (constant linear velocity) – equivalent to approximately 500 rpm at the inside of the disc, and approximately 200 rpm at the outside edge. (A disc played from beginning to end slows down during playback.)

Track pitch: 1.6 µm

Disc diameter 120 mm

Disc thickness: 1.2 mm

Inner radius program area: 25 mm

Outer radius program area: 58 mm

Center spindle hole diameter: 15 mm

The program area is 86.05 cm² and the length of the recordable spiral is (86.05 cm² / 1.6 µm) = 5.38 km. With a scanning speed of 1.2 m/s, the playing time is 74 minutes, or 650 MB of data on a CD-ROM. If the disc diameter were only 115 mm, the maximum playing time would have been 68 minutes, i.e., six minutes less. A disc with data packed slightly more densely is tolerated by most players (though some old ones fail). Using a linear velocity of 1.2 m/s and a track pitch of 1.5 µm yields a playing time of 80 minutes, or a data capacity of 700 MB. Even higher capacities on non-standard discs (up to 99 minutes) are available at least as recordables, but generally the tighter the tracks are squeezed, the worse the compatibility.

Data structure

The smallest entity in a CD is called a frame, which consists of 33 bytes and contains six complete 16-bit stereo samples (two bytes × two channels × six samples = 24 bytes). The other nine bytes consist of eight CIRC error-correction bytes and one subcode byte, used for control and display. Each byte is translated into a 14-bit word using eight-to-fourteen modulation, which alternates with three-bit merging words. In total there are 33 × (14 + 3) = 561 bits. A 27-bit unique synchronization word is added, so that the number of bits in a frame totals 588 (of which only 192 bits are music).

These 588-bit frames are in turn grouped into sectors. Each sector contains 98 frames, totaling 98 × 24 = 2352 bytes of music. The CD is played at a speed of 75 sectors per second, which results in 176,400 bytes per second. Divided by two channels and two bytes per sample, this results in a sample rate of 44,100 samples per second.

For CD-ROM data discs, the physical frame and sector sizes are the same. Since error concealment cannot be applied to non-audio data in case the CIRC error correction fails to recover the user data, a third layer of error correction is defined, reducing the payload to 2048 bytes per sector for the Mode-1 CD-ROM format. To increase the data-rate for Video CD, Mode-2 CD-ROM, the third layer has been omitted, increasing the payload to 2336 user-available bytes per sector, only 16 bytes (for synchronization and header data) less than available in Red-Book audio.

"Frame"

For the Red Book stereo audio CD, the time format is commonly measured in minutes, seconds and frames (mm:ss:ff), where one frame corresponds to one sector, or 1/75th of a second of stereo sound. In this context, the term frame is erroneously applied in editing applications and does not denote the physical frame described above. In editing and extracting, the frame is the smallest addressable time interval for an audio CD, meaning that track start and end positions can only be defined in 1/75 second steps.

Logical structure

The largest entity on a CD is called a track. A CD can contain up to 99 tracks (including a data track for mixed mode discs). Each track can in turn have up to 100 indexes, though players which handle this feature are rarely found outside of pro audio, particularly radio broadcasting. The vast majority of songs are recorded under index 1, with the pre-gap being index 0. Sometimes hidden tracks are placed at the end of the last track of the disc, often using index 2 or 3. This is also the case with some discs offering "101 sound effects", with 100 and 101 being indexed as two and three on track 99. The index, if used, is occasionally put on the track listing as a decimal part of the track number, such as 99.2 or 99.3. (Information Society's Hack was one of very few CD releases to do this, following a release with an equally obscure CD+G feature.) The track and index structure of the CD carried forward to the DVD as title and chapter, respectively.

Manufacturing tolerances

Current manufacturing processes allow an audio CD to contain up to 80 minutes (variable from one replication plant to another) without requiring the content creator to sign a waiver releasing the plant owner from responsibility if the CD produced is marginally or entirely unreadable by some playback equipment. Thus, in current practice, maximum CD playing time has crept higher by reducing minimum engineering tolerances; by and large, this has not unacceptably reduced reliability.

CD-Text

CD-Text is an extension of the Red Book specification for audio CD that allows for storage of additional text information (e.g., album name, song name, artist) on a standards-compliant audio CD. The information is stored either in the lead-in area of the CD, where there is roughly five kilobytes of space available, or in the subcode channels R to W on the disc, which can store about 31 megabytes.

CD + Graphics

Compact Disc + Graphics (CD+G) is a special audio Compact Disc that contains graphics data in addition to the audio data on the disc. The disc can be played on a regular audio CD player, but when played on a special CD+G player, can output a graphics signal (typically, the CD+G player is hooked up to a television set or a computer monitor); these graphics are almost exclusively used to display lyrics on a television set for karaoke performers to sing along with. The CD+G format takes advantage of the channels R through W. These six bits store the graphics information.

CD + Extended Graphics

Compact Disc + Extended Graphics (CD+EG, also known as CD+XG) is an improved variant of the Compact Disc + Graphics (CD+G) format. Like CD+G, CD+EG utilizes basic CD-ROM features to display text and video information in addition to the music being played. This extra data is stored in subcode channels R-W. Very few, if any, CD+EG discs have been published.

Super Audio CD

Super Audio CD (SACD) is a high-resolution read-only optical audio disc format that provides much higher fidelity digital audio reproduction than the Red Book. Introduced in 1999, it was developed by Sony and Philips, the same companies that created the Red Book. SACD was in a format war with DVD-Audio, but neither has replaced audio CDs.

In contrast to DVD-Audio, the SACD format has the feature of being able to produce hybrid discs; these discs contain the SACD audio stream as well as a standard audio CD layer which is playable in standard CD players, thus making them backward compatible.

CD-MIDI

CD-MIDI is a format used to store music-performance data which upon playback is performed by electronic instruments that synthesize the audio. Hence, unlike Red Book, these recordings are not audio.

CD-ROM

For the first few years of its existence, the Compact Disc was a medium used purely for audio. However, in 1985 the Yellow Book CD-ROM standard was established by Sony and Philips, which defined a non-volatile optical data computer data storage medium using the same physical format as audio Compact Discs, readable by a computer with a CD-ROM drive.

Video CD (VCD)

Video CD (VCD, View CD, and Compact Disc digital video) is a standard digital format for storing video media on a CD. VCDs are playable in dedicated VCD players, most modern DVD-Video players, personal computers, and some video game consoles.

The VCD standard was created in 1993 by Sony, Philips, Matsushita, and JVC and is referred to as the White Book standard.

Overall picture quality is intended to be comparable to VHS video. Poorly compressed VCD video can sometimes be lower quality than VHS video, but VCD exhibits block artifacts rather than analog noise, and does not deteriorate further with each use, which may be preferable.

352x240 (or SIF) resolution was chosen because it is half the vertical, and half the horizontal resolution of NTSC video. 352x288 is similarly one quarter PAL/SECAM resolution. This approximates the (overall) resolution of an analog VHS tape, which, although it has double the number of (vertical) scan lines, has a much lower horizontal resolution.

Super Video CD

Super Video CD (Super Video Compact Disc or SVCD) is a format used for storing video media on standard Compact Discs. SVCD was intended as a successor to VCD and an alternative to DVD-Video, and falls somewhere between both in terms of technical capability and picture quality.

SVCD has two-thirds the resolution of DVD, and over 2.7 times the resolution of VCD. One CD-R disc can hold up to 60 minutes of standard quality SVCD-format video. While no specific limit on SVCD video length is mandated by the specification, one must lower the video bit rate, and therefore quality, in order to accommodate very long videos. It is usually difficult to fit much more than 100 minutes of video onto one SVCD without incurring significant quality loss, and many hardware players are unable to play video with an instantaneous bit rate lower than 300 to 600 kilobits per second.

Photo CD

Photo CD is a system designed by Kodak for digitizing and storing photos on a CD. Launched in 1992, the discs were designed to hold nearly 100 high quality images, scanned prints and slides using special proprietary encoding. Photo CD discs are defined in the Beige Book and conform to the CD-ROM XA and CD-i Bridge specifications as well. They are intended to play on CD-i players, Photo CD players and any computer with the suitable software irrespective of the operating system. The images can also be printed out on photographic paper with a special Kodak machine. This format is not to be confused with Kodak Picture CD, which is a consumer product in CD-ROM format.

CD-i

The Philips "Green Book" specifies the standard for interactive multimedia Compact Discs designed for CD-i players. This format is unusual because it hides the initial tracks which contains the software and data files used by CD-i players by omitting the tracks from the disc's TOC (table of contents). This causes audio CD players to skip the CD-i data tracks. This is different from the CD-i Ready format, which puts CD-i software and data into the pregap of track 1. CDi was the leading format of its time but was supplanted by the politics of competition. Philips Interactive Media lead the way in producing breakthrough titles, including the first interactive coloring book, Sesame Street Disc and children's programs, Groliers and Comptoms encyclopedias and many more pathbreaking programs. During this period, Bernard Luskin, President of Philips Interactive Media pioneered the concept of applying psychology to media and the emerging field of media psychology.

Enhanced CD

Enhanced CD, also known as CD Extra and CD Plus, is a certification mark of the Recording Industry Association of America for various technologies that combine audio and computer data for use in both Compact Disc and CD-ROM players.

The primary data formats for Enhanced Compact Disc's are mixed mode (Yellow Book/Red Book), CD-i, hidden track, and multisession (Blue Book).

VinylDisc

VinylDisc is the hybrid of a standard Audio CD and the vinyl record. The vinyl layer on the disc's label side can hold approximately three minutes of music.

Manufacture

Replicated CDs are mass-produced initially using a hydraulic press. Small granules of heated raw polycarbonate plastic are fed into the press. A screw forces the liquefied plastic into the mold cavity. The mold closes with a metal stamper in contact with the disc surface. The plastic is allowed to cool and harden. Once opened, the disc substrate is removed from the mold by a robotic arm, and a 15 mm diameter center hole (called a stacking ring) is created. The time it takes to "stamp" one CD, is usually 2 to 3 seconds.

This method produces the clear plastic blank part of the disc. After a metallic reflecting layer (usually aluminum, but sometimes gold or other metal) is applied to the clear blank substrate, the disc goes under a UV light for curing and it is ready to go to press. To prepare to press a CD, a glass master is made, using a high-powered laser on a device similar to a CD writer. The glass master is a positive image of the desired CD surface (with the desired microscopic pits and lands). After testing, it is used to make a die by pressing it against a metal disc.

The die is a negative image of the glass master: typically, several are made, depending on the number of pressing mills that are to make the CD. The die then goes into a press and the physical image is transferred to the blank CD, leaving a final positive image on the disc. A small amount of lacquer is applied as a ring around the center of the disc, and rapid spinning spreads it evenly over the surface. Edge protection lacquer is applied before the disc is finished. The disc can then be printed and packed.

Manufactured CDs that are sold in stores are sealed via a process called "polywrapping" or shrink wrapping.

Recordable CD

CD-R next to a mechanical pencil]] Recordable Compact Discs, CD-Rs, are injection molded with a "blank" data spiral. A photosensitive dye is then applied, after which the discs are metalized and lacquer-coated. The write laser of the CD recorder changes the color of the dye to allow the read laser of a standard CD player to see the data, just as it would with a standard stamped disc. The resulting discs can be read by most CD-ROM drives and played in most audio CD players.

CD-R recordings are designed to be permanent. Over time the dye's physical characteristics may change, however, causing read errors and data loss until the reading device cannot recover with error correction methods. The design life is from 20 to 100 years, depending on the quality of the discs, the quality of the writing drive, and storage conditions. However, testing has demonstrated such degradation of some discs in as little as 18 months under normal storage conditions. This failure is known as CD rot. CD-Rs follow the Orange Book standard.

Recordable Audio CD

The Recordable Audio CD is designed to be used in a consumer audio CD recorder. These consumer audio CD recorders use SCMS (Serial Copy Management System), an early form of digital rights management (DRM), to conform to the AHRA (Audio Home Recording Act). The Recordable Audio CD is typically somewhat more expensive than CD-R due to (a) lower volume and (b) a 3% AHRA royalty used to compensate the music industry for the making of a copy.

High Capacity Recordable CD

A higher density recording format that can hold:

98.5 minutes of audio on a 12 cm disc (compared to about 80 minutes for Red Book audio).

30 minutes of audio on an 8 cm disc (compared to about 24 minutes for Red Book audio).

ReWritable CD

CD-RW is a re-recordable medium that uses a metallic alloy instead of a dye. The write laser in this case is used to heat and alter the properties (amorphous vs. crystalline) of the alloy, and hence change its reflectivity. A CD-RW does not have as great a difference in reflectivity as a pressed CD or a CD-R, and so many earlier CD audio players cannot read CD-RW discs, although most later CD audio players and stand-alone DVD players can. CD-RWs follow the Orange Book standard.

High Speed ReWritable CD

Due to technical limitations, the original ReWritable CD could be written no faster than 4x speed. High Speed ReWritable CD has a different design that permits writing at speeds ranging from 4x to 12x.

Original CD-RW drives can only write to original ReWritable CDs. High Speed CD-RW drives can typically write to both original ReWritable CD discs and High Speed ReWritable CD discs. Both types of CD-RW discs can be read in most CD drives.

Higher speed CD-RW discs, Ultra Speed (16x to 24x write speed) and Ultra Speed+ (32x write speed), are now available.

ReWritable Audio CD

The ReWritable Audio CD is designed to be used in a consumer audio CD recorder, which won't (without modification) accept standard CD-RW discs. These consumer audio CD recorders use the Serial Copy Management System (SCMS), an early form of digital rights management (DRM), to conform to the United States' Audio Home Recording Act (AHRA). The ReWritable Audio CD is typically somewhat more expensive than CD-RW due to (a) lower volume and (b) a 3% AHRA royalty used to compensate the music industry for the making of a copy.

Copy protection

The Red Book audio specification, except for a simple 'anti-copy' bit in the subcode, does not include any copy protection mechanism. Starting in early 2002, attempts were made by record companies to market "copy-protected" non-standard Compact Discs, which cannot be ripped, or copied, to hard drives or easily converted to MP3s. One major drawback to these copy-protected discs is that most will not play on either computer CD-ROM drives, or some standalone CD players that use CD-ROM mechanisms. Philips has stated that such discs are not permitted to bear the trademarked Compact Disc Digital Audio logo because they violate the Red Book specifications. Numerous copy-protection systems have been countered by readily available, often free, software.

See also

5.1 Music Disc

Audio format

Audio storage

Bit rot

Blu-ray disc

Compact-disc bronzing

Compact-disc player

Digipak

DualDisc

DVD

DVD-Audio

HD-DVD

High-Definition Compatible Digital (HDCD)

High fidelity

Home cinema

Jewel case

K2 High Definition

Laserdisc

MildDisc

MP3 CD

Rainbow Books

SPARS code, for information on the three-letter codes AAD, ADD, DAD, and DDD

Video Single Disc

Virtual drive

References

Further reading

Ecma International. Standard ECMA-130: Data Interchange on Read-only 120 mm Optical Data Disks (CD-ROM), 2nd edition (June 1996).

Pohlmann, Kenneth C. (1992). The Compact Disc Handbook. Middleton, Wisconsin: A-R Editions. ISBN 0-89579-300-8.

Peek, Hans et al. (2009) Origins and Successors of the Compact Disc. Springer Science+Business Media B.V. ISBN 978-1-4020-9552-8.

External links

Video How Compact Discs are Manufactured

CD-Recordable FAQ Exhaustive basics on CDs

Philips history of the CD (cache)

Sony's CD history

Patent History (CD Player) - published by Philips 2005

Patent History CD Disc - published by Philips 2003

Sony History, Chapter 8, This is the replacement of Gramophone record ! (第8章 レコードに代わるものはこれだ) - Sony website in Japanese

Category:1982 introductions Category:Audio storage Category:Digital audio Category:High-end audio Category:Video storage Category:Dutch inventions Category:Japanese inventions

Name	Tiësto
Background	non_vocal_instrumentalist
Birth name	Tijs Michiel Verwest
Alias	DJ Tiësto, Allure, Da Joker, Drumfire, Handover Circuit, Paradise In Dubs, Passenger, Roze, Steve Forte Rio, Stray Dog, Tom Ace, Wild Bunch
Born	January 17, 1969Breda, North Brabant, Netherlands
Genre	Electronic dance, trance, progressive trance, electro house, house
Occupation	Musician, disc jockey, record producer
Years active	1994–present
Label	Noculan (1994)Basic Beat (1994–1997)Lightning (1995–1996)XSV Music (1997)Black Hole (1997–2009)Ultra Records (2007-present)Musical Freedom (2009–present)
Associated acts	Current: Jedidja, Clear View, TaxigirlFormer: Gouryella, Kamaya Painters (more)
Url

Tiësto OON (; born Tijs Michiel Verwest on January 17, 1969) an alias which is a twist of his childhood nickname.

In 1997, he founded the label Black Hole Recordings with Arny Bink, where he released the Magik and In Search of Sunrise CD series. In 1999 and 2000 he collaborated with Ferry Corsten to create Gouryella. His 2000 remix of Delerium's "Silence" featuring Sarah McLachlan exposed him to more mainstream audiences. In 2001 he released his first solo album In My Memory which gave him several major hits that launched his career. He was named "World’s No.1 DJ" 3 consecutive times by DJ Magazine from 2002 through 2004.

Just after releasing his second studio album Just Be in 2004 at the Summer Olympics, he performed live at the opening ceremony in Athens, Greece, becoming the first DJ to play live on stage at an Olympics. Tracks he made especially for the Olympics were mixed together and released as the mix compilation Parade of the Athletes later that year. In April 2007 Tiësto launched both his radio show Tiësto's Club Life on Radio 538 in the Netherlands and released his third studio album titled Elements of Life. The album reached number one on the Dutch album chart as well on "Billboard Top Electronic Albums" in the U.S. and received a nomination for a Grammy Award in 2008. Tiësto released his fourth studio album called Kaleidoscope in October 2009.

Life and musical career

Early life and career

Tijs Michiel Verwest was born in Breda, North Brabant, Netherlands on January 17, 1969. He had an interest in music since the age of twelve. When he was fourteen he decided to dedicate more time to it and began DJing professionally at school parties. He then moved on to become a resident DJ between 1985 and 1994 at several clubs in the Netherlands after his manager and friend Wilfred encouraged him. However, it was at The Spock, a small club in Breda, where he was able to fine-tune his own style by playing in a separate room from 10 p.m. until 4 a.m. on weekends. In the beginning of his career, as a DJ he played mostly New Beat and acid house.

In 1994, he began releasing material on Noculan Records' sub-labels Chemo and Coolman. During these years, he produced hardcore/gabber tracks under aliases such as Da Joker and DJ Limited. He was later discovered by the general manager of Rotterdam-based Basic Beat Recordings. In late 1994, he signed to Basic Beat where he met Arny Bink, Tiësto released records on the sub-label Trashcan, founded by Arny, and later created the Guardian Angel sub-label with Arny in which they introduced the popular Forbidden Paradise series. Meanwhile from 1995 to 1996 he released four extended plays on Bonzai Jumps and XTC, sub-labels of Lightning Records. In 1997, Tiësto joined his friend Yves Vandichel on his sub-label, DJ Yves, a division of the now defunct Human Resource label XSV Music. In the fall of 1997, both Arny and Tiësto decided to leave Basic Beat and create their own parent label, now known as Black Hole Recordings, Trashcan was discontinued and Guardian Angel continued releasing music until 2002. Through Black Hole, Tiësto released the Magik series and also created two major sub-labels in 1998; In Trance We Trust and SongBird.

From 1998 to 1999, Tiësto released music on Planetary Consciousness were he met A&R; Hardy Heller and invited him to release some records on Black Hole. Tiësto later included the In Search of Sunrise series on SongBird. In 1999, Tiësto joined forces with fellow Dutch deejay Ferry Corsten to create the trance based duo of Gouryella.

Late in 2000, Tiësto decided to concentrate on his personal work and left Corsten by himself to write and produce Gouryella's next single with John Ewbank, the record company was demanding more tracks and neither Tiësto or Ferry could work together at the time. Tiësto introduced Armin van Buuren, Johan Gielen and Ferry Corsten to the mainstream with his first compilations and the In Trance We Trust series. Summerbreeze became Tiësto's debut DJ mix album in the US with the help of a contract signed to Nettwerk.

In My Memory era (2001–2004)

Tiësto's fame started to rise in the early 2000s after his set at the first ID&T; Innercity party (), and the release of In My Memory, his first solo album released in 2001 which contained 10 singles and 5 major hits; The singles from the album were: "Lethal Industry" which was actually produced in 1999 and had only 3 copies released at that time, the track was officially released in 2001 which was remixed by Richard Durand in 2006 along with "Flight 643" which was another leading single that was later adapted with vocals by Suzanne Palmer and released as "643 (Love's on Fire)". Other tracks were "Obsession" in which Tiësto worked alongside Junkie XL, the instrumental tracks "Dallas 4PM" and "Suburban Train" with "Urban Train" as its B-Side which contained some vocals. The last singles to be released were "In My Memory" which is the title track for the album as it only received high ratings in the United States and the opening track "Magik Journey" which opened Tiësto in Concert (2003). On February 2, 2002 Tiësto played nine consecutive hours during the second edition of the Dutch Dimension festival. On February 27 he was awarded a Zilveren ('Silver') Harp music award. The same year he also received a Lucky Strike Dance Award in the category Best DJ Trance/Progressive. In August he became part of Moby's Area2 Tour. For eighteen days he travelled through the United States with artists such as Moby himself, but also David Bowie and Busta Rhymes. In January 2003 Tiësto received the annual Dutch Popprijs ('Pop Award') during the Noorderslag festival. After touring with Moby, Tiësto remixed two songs from him, "We Are All Made of Stars" and "Extreme Ways" in the same year, having "We Are All Made of Stars" reach #13 in the Hot Dance Club Play. In 2002 he released his first In Search of Sunrise mix to feature a place on its name, . On March 28, 2003; Tiësto, Dieselboy, Bad Boy Bill, and Noel Sanger joined the PlayStation2 Dual Play tour. Tiësto and Noel's appearance began on April 13 and ended on June 6.

His fame continued to skyrocket in the early 2000s, following his six-hour "Tiësto Solo" sets which he performed without other DJs or opening acts. This idea, of one DJ playing alone to a large crowd, was brought to its pinnacle when Tiësto was the first DJ to hold a solo concert in a stadium; on May 10, 2003, he performed for over 25,000 people in Arnhem's GelreDome. In addition to holding these two concerts for 35,000 of his fans, he held another concert for a crowd of 20,000 in Hasselt, Belgium the following week. It consists of 200+ minutes of performances with a second disc with special features, It includes a behind-the-scenes looking at The Making Of the event, the music video for his song "Traffic" and TV Commercials for the event. The second DVD has performances from Aqualung and violin player DJ Mason, Micha Klein and the Bulgarian Children of Orpheus choir. During this period, he was crowned as "No. 1. DJ in the World" by DJ Magazine (UK) in 2002, 2003, and 2004.

Just Be era (2004–2007)

In 2004, he released his second artist album Just Be, which featured his first single "Traffic" which is the first non-vocal track to reach number one spot in the Dutch national charts for 23 years. The track "Sweet Misery" was originally written for Evanescence but it did not meet the deadline for the release of their album. In support to his Just Be album, he played at Breda, Eindhoven, Utrecht, and Amsterdam; these stops were later named . On May 20, 2004 he was appointed Officer of the Order of Orange-Nassau by Her Majesty Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands.

at the 2004 Summer Olympics opening ceremony]]

The Athens Organizing Committee for the Olympic Games (ATHOC) asked Tiësto to perform at the Olympic Games, making him the first DJ to play live on stage at an Olympic Games at the 2004 Summer Olympics opening ceremony in Athens, where he played for 90 minutes. Tiësto flew to Athens in January 2004 to have a meeting with the ATHOC. His Tiësto in Concert DVD caught their attention, after which he was asked to write more tracks based on his opening tune "Adagio for Strings" which could fit in with the Olympic spirit and combine the classical with the modern age; They also requested that he play his own produced music. The first rehearsal was on Saturday August, 7, for an empty stadium; the second rehearsal was on Sunday August 8 with 35,000 volunteers, a lot of the people recognised some tracks like "Traffic" and "Adagio for Strings". The last rehearsal included almost 60,000 people in the stadium which was on Tuesday August 10, there were some technical problems, the mixer broke down, the monitors dropped out a couple of times and the music in the stadium was not continuously on the right volume.

During the parade on Friday, August 13, 2004, all participating nations introduced their athletes—10,500 in total There were 80,000 spectators, only 75,000 knowing about dance music. During the course of his performance the Dutch athletes started dancing in front of the DJ booth and had to be moved on by officials. The performance included new tracks produced especially for the Opening Ceremony and songs that were created to complement the spirit and theme of the ceremony. A condensed studio-recorded album of the songs played on the Olympic set was later released, including new songs specially composed for the occasion, entitled Parade of the Athletes in October 2004. In the liner notes, he noted the IOC requested that the music not contain any lyrics as they could be inadvertently misinterpreted.

In late 2004, he began his touring across Latin America, with his release of in which he gained influence from the sun and sand in summer 2002. The tour continued in 2005, and Tiësto performed live at Brazil, Argentina, Panama, Peru, Costa Rica, Uruguay, Paraguay, Ecuador and Colombia. Following the tours, was released in 2005, featuring a second CD for the first time in the In Search of Sunrise series.

In 2005, his Perfect Remixes Vol. 3 compilation was released through Warlock Records, containing ten tracks which were created during the beginning of his career, between those is Junkie XL, Mauro Picotto and The Roc Project. On August 20, 2005, Verwest took Tiësto in Concert to the US when he played to 16,000 at the Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena with Cirque du Soleil dancers. For the second year in a row he performed live at a New Year's Eve/New Year's concert in Las Vegas, Nevada at the Orleans Arena to a sell-out crowd. Despite his four-city US tour being postponed due to the hurricane damage in New Orleans and Miami, playing such cities further expanded and cemented his popularity among mainstream audiences. This was surpassed later in summer 2007 when some 250,000 danced on Ipanema Beach, Brazil, becoming the second largest concert in history. BPM magazine has an annual poll in the US which is unveiled in the WMC, in 2005 Tiësto took the No. 1 spot. The influences of Los Angeles remained with him and would later influence his In Search of Sunrise compilation.

in Portrush, Northern Ireland on March 5, 2005]]

A wax sculpture of Tiësto was placed behind a turntable at Madame Tussauds in Amsterdam where visitors can mix Tiësto's music together. In the fall of 2005 he went on a very successful tour across Central and Eastern Europe where he played once in each country to crowds of 10,000 to 15,000 fans. Stops were made in Ukraine, Slovakia, Serbia, Macedonia, Romania, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Turkey, Croatia, Poland and South Africa. The United States tour that was part of Tiësto in Concert was dwarfed by his appearance at Sensation White in 2006 where he performed to over 45,000 people in the world's biggest dance event in Amsterdam, Holland.

was released in 2006 which was certified Gold in Canada for sales over 50,000 copies. It also charted, peaking #34 in Canada and #59 in Austria. The compilation was launched in the Winter Music Conference at Mansion in South Beach Miami to support his release, Tiësto went on his In Search of Sunrise 5 Asia Tour for more than 3 weeks.

In September 2006, Tiësto was admitted to hospital after experiencing pain in his chest. He was diagnosed with pericarditis and subsequently had to cancel a number of shows. With the diagnosis, he was invited to support Dance4Life to help teens who are not aware of the risks of HIV/AIDS. He was chosen as the official ambassador for the Dance4Life foundation in May 2006, and released the song "Dance4Life" with Maxi Jazz to help spread the awareness of HIV/AIDS.

On April 6, 2007 Tiësto began presenting a new weekly two-hour radio show called Tiësto's Club Life on Dutch radio station Radio 538. It is syndicated worldwide and later released as a Podcast.

Elements of Life era (2007–2009)

in Amsterdam on March 16, 2007]]

On April 16, 2007, Tiësto released his third studio album Elements of Life, the album moved 73,000 units in its April release, according to Nielsen SoundScan. The album consists of rock, trance and experimental music, which shows the style Tiësto has grown throughout the years since his previous albums which contained lyrics, In My Memory and Just Be. Producer Brian Transeau collaborated with Tiësto in three tracks, he composed "Bright Morningstar" and "Sweet Things", he also performed the vocals in the single "Break My Fall". Together, they produced more tracks which were not released in the album, Tiësto has mentioned they would work again during the coming summer. A special release party was held at the Heineken Music Hall in Amsterdam on November 3, 2007 for .

His last three full-length releases broke the 70,000 mark, and the 2003 2CD compilation Nyana recently hit 87,000, according to Nielsen SoundScan. In support of the album, he embarked on his Elements of Life World Tour which had shows across the world. Tiësto's performance at Parken Stadium in Copenhagen, Denmark on November 10, 2007 was also sold out. The DVD was released in a party which was held on February 29, 2008 in London at the IndigO2 club.

Tiësto announced his residence at Privilege, officially recognised by the Guinness World Records as being the largest club in the world. He played in Ibiza every Monday, from July 7 until September 22. The gigs consisted of sets in the style of his In Search of Sunrise series. In 2007, he had released which was inspired by the island. The residencies also featured the performance of guest deejays, all selected by Tiësto, such as Chris Lake, Andy Duguid, Mat Zo, Cosmic Gate, Alex Kunnari and Sander van Doorn as well as exclusive appearances by Fonzerelli and Airbase.

in London on August 8, 2008]]

On April 28, Tiësto released , a recompilation of the Elements of Life album with all songs being replaced by remixed versions. In mid-2008, Tiësto announced his , which will be presented by Armani Exchange on May in support of his upcoming compilation On July 31, he was the first DJ to perform for 25,000 people at an exclusive outdoor concert in Victoria Park, London.

Kaleidoscope era (2009–present)

On October 6, 2009, Tiësto released his fourth studio album Kaleidoscope, which featured artists such as Priscilla Ahn, Calvin Harris, Tegan & Sara and Nelly Furtado. Unlike his earlier albums, which were all mostly trance, Kaleidoscope explores other electronic genres, and is considered Tiesto's most experimental album. The first single "I Will Be Here" featuring Sneaky Sound System being released in July 2009. In its first week, the album reached the Top 10 chart on iTunes.

To release the album he has set up a new record label called Musical Freedom after parting ways with Black Hole Recordings. Tiësto felt that his music was evolving in a new direction and his focus as an artist was moving away from what Black Hole was set up to support. His new tour, sharing the name of his new album, called Kaleidoscope World Tour commenced in late September.

Tiësto contributed songs to both DJ Hero and DJ Hero 2 video games and is a playable character in the second game. He contributed two exclusive mixes to the second game, and used content from DJ Hero 2 to create the official video for his single 'Speed Rail' - the world's first music video to be created entirely using in-game footage.

Tiësto has produced a trance-flavoured song on Memphis rap duo Three 6 Mafia's upcoming album Laws of Power called "Feel It," which features Flo Rida and Sean Kingston.

On March 16, 2010, Tiësto released his greatest hits album called Magikal Journey: The Hits Collection 1998-2008, a two disc album focusing on his most famous songs and remixes of his songs.

On April 7, 2010, Tiësto announced that he would start a new compilation series called A New Dawn with his own label Musical Freedom. In his interview Tiësto furthermore confirmed that he will no longer have any more involvement with Black Hole Recordings.

On August 31, 2010 was released, a remix album of his album Kaleidoscope.

On December 11, 2010, Tiësto was one of the headlining acts at ZoukOut 2010, which was held in Singapore at Siloso Beach, Sentosa Island.

Philanthropy

On January 6, 2005, Tiësto performed in an outdoor fundraiser in De Dam, Amsterdam. The event was free, and many famous Dutch artists like Dinand Woesthoff, BLØF, Acda & De Munnik, Di-rect, Berget Lewis, Xander de Buisonjé and Trijntje Oosterhuis were involved in it to provide financial aid to the people who suffered from the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami in Southern and Southeastern Asia. All profits made of all TV commercials and live broadcast were given to the organisations collecting the relief funds.

In April 2006, Tiësto was named the official worldwide ambassador for the Dance4Life foundation promoting awareness of HIV/AIDS, as the foundation's ambassador he has helped the organisation with fundraising along with recording the track "Dance4life" that he recorded with Maxi Jazz from Faithless. The foundation consists on a better way of living with safe sex in exchange of entertainment to the young crowd. The song was a huge success, peaking for five weeks in #3 and eleven consecutive weeks in the Top 10 of the Dutch Singles Chart, it also reached #5 in Belgium, #6 in Finland and also charting in the UK and Germany. With the successful release of Elements of Life, Tiësto and fashion designer Giorgio Armani collaborated together on a limited edition Tiësto T-shirt available at Armani Exchange stores. His single "Sweet Things" comes with the shirt including an exclusive "A|X Remix" by Tom Cloud which shows the great influence Tiësto has in fashion culture. The charity raised over US$300,000. On November 29, 2008 artists like Tiësto himself, Sied van Riel, Leon Bolier, Joop, and MC Gunner presented a concert at The Sand, Amsterdam promoted by Dance4Life, the sales from the event will go to the foundation to support next year's Schools4Life project.

Personal life

Until early 2006, Tiësto was in a relationship with Dutch model Monique Spronk. On January 10, 2008, Dutch newspaper De Telegraaf announced that Tiësto and his girlfriend Stacey Blokzijl were going to get married on October 10, 2008 in Cartagena, Colombia. He proposed to her in December 2007 while they were visiting Mauritius. Tiësto cancelled his wedding for October 10, because he claimed to have a busy schedule and too little time for the preparations. During Christmas 2008, Blokzijl broke off the engagement due to the constant delays to their wedding.

Discography

;Studio albums

In My Memory (2001)

Just Be (2004)

Parade of the Athletes (2004)

Elements of Life (2007)

Kaleidoscope (2009)

Tours

2002: Area2 Tour

2004:

2005: Tiësto in Concert: North America Tour 2005

2005: Central Eastern European Tour 2005

2006: In Search of Sunrise 5 Asia Tour

2007–2008: Elements of Life World Tour

2008:

2009–2010: Kaleidoscope World Tour

See also

List of awards and nominations received by Tiësto

Tiësto's Club Life

References

External links

InTheBooth - official members-only fansite

Artist Site at Ultra Records

Category:Tiësto Category:1969 births Category:2004 Summer Olympics Category:Club DJs Category:Dutch dance musicians Category:Dutch DJs Category:Dutch electronic musicians Category:Dutch record producers Category:Dutch trance musicians Category:Eurodance musicians Category:Living people Category:People from Breda Category:Remixers Category:World Music Awards winners Category:Ultra Records artists Category:Officers of the Order of Orange-Nassau

}}

Leonidas Sabanis (, born October 28, 1971 in Korçë, Albania as Luan Shabani) is a Greek weightlifter, who represented Greece in 1996, 2000 and 2004 Summer Olympics. His last name is sometimes also spelled as Sampanis.

Sabanis won a silver medal in the 59 kg category at the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, USA and in the 62 kg category in the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, Australia. Sabanis was originally awarded a bronze medal at the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens, but the medal was later stripped from him as a result of a doping scandal.

At the European Championship in Aalborg (Denmark) in 1990, the young talented weightlifter, Sabanis was declared European Champion for Albania.

References

Category:1971 births Category:Albanian weightlifters Category:Greek weightlifters Category:Olympic weightlifters of Greece Category:Weightlifters at the 1996 Summer Olympics Category:Weightlifters at the 2000 Summer Olympics Category:Weightlifters at the 2004 Summer Olympics Category:Olympic silver medalists for Greece Category:Living people Category:Doping cases in weightlifting Category:Greek sportspeople in doping cases Sabanis Sabanis

|name	Ludovico Einaudi
Background	non_vocal_instrumentalist
Birth name	Ludovico Einaudi
Born	November 23, 1955Turin, Piedmont, Italy
Instrument	piano, synthesizer, keyboard
Genre	Classical, Minimalist, film score
Occupation	Musician, sound designer, film score composer
Years active	1980–present
Label	Sony Classical
Url	http://www.einaudiwebsite.com/

Ludovico Einaudi OMRI (born 23 November 1955 in Turin, Piedmont) is an Italian contemporary music composer and pianist.

Biography

Born in Turin, Italy, Einaudi's mother played to him on the piano as a child. He began his musical training at the Conservatorio Verdi in Milan, gaining a diploma in composition in 1982. That same year, he studied with Luciano Berio and gained a scholarship to the Tanglewood Music Festival.

After studying at the Conservatory in Milan, and subsequently with Berio, he spent several years composing in traditional forms. In the mid-1980s he began to search for a more personal expression in a series of works for dance and multimedia, and later for piano. His music is ambient, meditative and often introspective, drawing on minimalism, world music, and contemporary pop. He has made a significant impact in the film world, with four international awards to his name.

His father was Giulio Einaudi, a publisher, and his grandfather, Luigi Einaudi, was President of the Italian Republic between 1948 and 1955. He currently resides on a vineyard in the Italian region of Piedmont.

Music

{| class="toccolours" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; font-size: 85%; background:#c6dbf7; color:black; width:23em; max-width: 25%;" cellspacing="5" | "In general I don't like definitions, but 'Minimalist' is a term that means elegance and openness, so I would prefer to be called a Minimalist than something else." |- | style="text-align: left;" | Ludovico Einaudi |}

Although Einaudi would prefer not to be labeled as any particular type of genre, he is sometimes referred to as a Minimalist. However, Einaudi's style differs from those of the Minimalism movement, and this attribution is likely more due to his work's sparse orchestration and simple melodies. Many of his songs appear on the show Waterloo Road.

Einaudi's own words on the matter reflect this viewpoint, with Einaudi referring to Minimalism as "elegance and openness", despite its more formal definition as a musical movement to which he arguably does not belong.

Einaudi is signed to Sony Music Entertainment's classical music division, Sony Classical.

Works

Time Out (1988)

Stanze (1992, harp)

Salgari (1995)

Le Onde (1996, piano)

Eden Roc (1999, piano and strings)

I Giorni (2001, piano)

Diario Mali (2003; piano)

Una Mattina (2004; piano, violin)

Divenire (2007; piano, string quartet)

Nightbook (2009; piano, electronic)

Recordings

1988 Time Out - BMG Ricordi

1992 Stanze - BMG Ricordi

1995 Salgari - BMG Ricordi

1996 Le Onde - BMG Ricordi

1998 Fuori dal Mondo - BMG Ricordi

1998 Ultimi Fuochi - BMG Ricordi

1999 Eden Roc - BMG Ricordi

2001 I Giorni - BMG Ricordi

2001 Luce dei miei Occhi- BMG Ricordi

2002 Dr. Zhivago - BMG Ricordi

2003 La Scala Concert 03.03.03 - BMG Ricordi

2003 Le parole di mio padre - BMG Ricordi

2003 Diario Mali (with Ballaké Sissoko) - Ponderosa IRD

2004

2004 Una Mattina - Ponderosa Music and Art/Decca/Sony Classical

2006 Divenire - Ponderosa Music and Art/Decca

2009 Cloudland - Ponderosa Music and Art

2009 Nightbook - Ponderosa Music and Art/Decca

2010 The Royal Albert Hall Concert - Ponderosa Music and Art

Film and television scores

1988: Treno di panna (Director: Andrea De Carlo)

1994: Da qualche parte in città (Director: Michele Sordillo)

1996: Acquario (Director: Michele Sordillo)

1998: Aprile (Director: Nanni Moretti)

1998: Giorni dispari (Director: Dominick Tambasco)

1999: Fuori dal mondo (Director: Giuseppe Piccioni)

2000: La vita altrui (Director: Michele Sordillo)

2000: Un delitto impossibile (Director: Antonio Luigi Grimaldi)

2001: Le parole di mio padre (Director: Francesca Comencini)

2001: Alexandria (Director: Maria Iliou)

2002: Luce dei miei occhi (Director: Giuseppe Piccioni) – Italian music award for best film score

2002: Doctor Zhivago (TV mini-series, Director: Giacomo Campiotti)

2004: Sotto falso nome (Director: Roberto Andò) – Prize for the best film music at Avignon Film Festival 2004

2004: Mission: Saturn

2006: This is England (Director: Shane Meadows) 2010: This is England '86 (Director: Shane Meadows)

2010: Stargate Universe - Pathogen

2010: Sangandaan - Landas ng Buhay

2010: I Giorni - Score for Airtel commercial (India)

2010: Nightbook - Any Human Heart (Channel 4)

2010: I'm Still Here (Director: Casey Affleck)

References

The Independent review Album: Ludovico Einaudi, Nightbook (Decca) (16 October 2009), accessed 19 February 2010

Voce di Italia review of Ludovico Einaudi – The Nightbook Tour by Daniele Orlandi (13 February 2010), accessed 19 February 2010 (Italian)

Romagna Noi review Ravenna - Ludovico Einaudi all'Alighieri by Daniele Orlandi (8 February 2010), accessed 19 February 2010 (Italian)

External links

Composer's website

Chester Novello biographical page

Ponderosa biographical page, accessed 19 February 2010

A brief critical essay on Ludovico Einaudi

History and Mystery: The piano spheres of Ludovico Einaudi, Bluefat interview

Category:1955 births Category:Living people Category:20th-century classical composers Category:21st-century classical composers Category:Italian classical pianists Category:Italian composers Category:Italian film score composers Category:Minimalist composers Category:Milan Conservatory alumni Category:People from Turin (city)