Eurozone (euro area)

Eurozone as of 2012   Non-eurozone areas using the euro
Currency	euro
Union type	Economic & Monetary
Established	1 January 1999
Members	17 Austria Belgium Cyprus Estonia Finland France Germany Greece Ireland Italy Luxembourg Malta Netherlands Portugal Slovakia Slovenia Spain Future members Further usage
Governance
Political control	Euro Group
Group president	Jean-Claude Juncker
Issuing authority	European Central Bank
ECB president	Mario Draghi
Affiliated with	European Union
Statistics
Population (2011)	331,962,860[1]
GDP (2010)	€9.2 trillion[2]
Interest rate	1.00%[3]
Inflation	1.6%[4]
Unemployment	10%[5]
Trade balance	€0.9 bn surplus[6]

The eurozone ( pronunciation (help·info)), officially called the euro area,^[7] is an economic and monetary union (EMU) of 17 European Union (EU) member states that have adopted the euro (€) as their common currency and sole legal tender. The eurozone currently consists of Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia, and Spain. Most other EU states are obliged to join once they meet the criteria to do so. No state has left and there are no provisions to do so or to be expelled.

Monetary policy of the zone is the responsibility of the European Central Bank (ECB) which is governed by a president and a board of the heads of national central banks. The principal task of the ECB is to keep inflation under control. Though there is no common representation, governance or fiscal policy for the currency union, some co-operation does take place through the Euro Group, which makes political decisions regarding the eurozone and the euro. The Euro Group is composed of the finance ministers of eurozone states, however in emergencies, national leaders also form the Euro Group.

Since the late-2000s financial crisis, the eurozone has established and used provisions for granting emergency loans to member states in return for the enactment of economic reforms. The eurozone has also enacted some limited fiscal integration, for example in peer review of each other's national budgets. The issue is highly political and in a state of flux as of 2011 in terms of what further provisions will be agreed for eurozone reform.

On occasion the eurozone is taken to include non-EU members who use the euro as their official currency. Some of these countries, like San Marino, have concluded formal agreements with the EU to use the currency and mint their own coins.^[8] Others, like Kosovo and Montenegro, have adopted the euro unilaterally. However, these countries do not formally form part of the eurozone and do not have representation in the ECB or the Euro Group.^[9]

Members[link]

In 1998 eleven European Union member states had met the convergence criteria, and the eurozone came into existence with the official launch of the euro (alongside national currencies) on 1 January 1999. Greece qualified in 2000 and was admitted on 1 January 2001 before physical notes and coins were introduced on 1 January 2002 replacing all national currencies. Between 2007 and 2011, five new states acceded.

  EU Eurozone (17)

  EU states obliged to join the Eurozone (8)

  EU states with an opt-out on Eurozone participation (2)

  States outside the EU with issuing rights (3)

  Other non-EU users of euro (4)

• v
• t
• e

State	Adopted	Population (Jan. 1, 2011)	Nominal GDP World Bank, 2009	Relative GDP of total (nominal)	Exceptions
Austria	01999-01-011 January 1999	&100000000084042520000008,404,252	&10000000000384908000000384,908	3.09%
Belgium	01999-01-011 January 1999	&1000000001091840500000010,918,405	&10000000000468522000000468,522	3.76%
Cyprus	02008-01-011 January 2008	&10000000000804435000000804,435	&1000000000002491000000024,910	0.20%	Northern Cyprus[note 1]
Estonia	02011-01-011 January 2011	&100000000013401940000001,340,194	&1000000000001912000000019,120	0.15%
Finland	01999-01-011 January 1999	&100000000053752760000005,375,276	&10000000000237512000000237,512	1.91%
France	01999-01-011 January 1999	&1000000006507537300000065,075,373	&100000000026493900000002,649,390	21.26%	New Caledonia[note 2]  French Polynesia[note 2]  Wallis and Futuna[note 2]
Germany	01999-01-011 January 1999	&1000000008175160200000081,751,602	&100000000033300320000003,330,032	26.73%
Greece	02001-01-011 January 2001	&1000000001132589700000011,325,897	&10000000000329924000000329,924	2.65%
Ireland	01999-01-011 January 1999	&100000000044808580000004,480,858	&10000000000227193000000227,193	1.82%
Italy	01999-01-011 January 1999	&1000000006062644200000060,626,442	&100000000021127800000002,112,780	16.96%	Campione d'Italia[note 3]
Luxembourg	01999-01-011 January 1999	&10000000000511840000000511,840	&1000000000005244900000052,449	0.42%
Malta	02008-01-011 January 2008	&10000000000417617000000417,617	&100000000000074490000007,449	0.06%
Netherlands	01999-01-011 January 1999	&1000000001665579900000016,655,799	&10000000000792128000000792,128	6.36%	Aruba[note 4] Curaçao[note 5] Sint Maarten[note 5] Caribbean Netherlands[note 6]
Portugal	01999-01-011 January 1999	&1000000001063697900000010,636,979	&10000000000227676000000227,676	1.83%
Slovakia	02009-01-011 January 2009	&100000000054352730000005,435,273	&1000000000008764200000087,642	0.70%
Slovenia	02007-01-011 January 2007	&100000000020501890000002,050,189	&1000000000004847700000048,477	0.39%
Spain	01999-01-011 January 1999	&1000000004615292600000046,152,926	&100000000014602500000001,460,250	11.72%
Eurozone		&10000000331963357000000331,963,357	&1000000001246036200000012,460,362	100%

Enlargement[link]

Ten countries (Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Sweden, and the United Kingdom) are EU members but do not use the euro. Before joining the eurozone, a state must spend two years in the European Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM II). As of 2011, the National Central Banks (NCBs) of Latvia, Lithuania, and Denmark have participated in ERM II.

A clickable Euler diagram showing the relationships between various multinational European organisations.v • d • e

Denmark and the United Kingdom obtained special opt-outs in the original Maastricht Treaty. Both countries are legally exempt from joining the eurozone unless their governments decide otherwise, either by parliamentary vote or referendum. Sweden gained a de facto opt-out by using a legal loophole. It is required to join the eurozone as soon as it fulfils the convergence criteria, which include being part of ERM II for two years; joining ERM II is voluntary.^[10][11] Sweden has so far decided not to join ERM II.

The 2008 financial crisis increased interest in Denmark and initially in Poland to join the eurozone, and in Iceland to join the European Union, a pre-condition for adopting the euro.^[12] Since Latvia requested help from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), as a precondition, it may be forced to drop its currency peg. This would take Latvia out of ERM II and possibly move the euro adoption date even further from 2013 than currently planned.^[13] However, by 2010, the debt crisis in the euro zone caused interest from Poland and the Czech Republic to cool.^[14]

Non-member usage[link]

The euro is also used in countries outside the EU. Three states—Monaco, San Marino, and Vatican City—^[15][16] have signed formal agreements with the EU to use the euro and mint their own coins. Nevertheless, they are not considered part of the eurozone by the ECB and do not have a seat in the ECB or Euro Group. Andorra reached a monetary agreement with the EU in June 2011 which will allow it to use the euro as its official currency when ratified. Under the agreement it is intended that Andorra should gain the right to mint its own euro coins as of 1 July 2013, provided that Andorra implements relevant EU legislation.^[17]

Some states (viz. Kosovo,^{[note 7]} and Montenegro) officially adopted the euro as their sole currency without an agreement and, therefore, have no issuing rights. These states are not considered part of the eurozone by the ECB. However, in some usage, the term eurozone is applied to all territories that have adopted the euro as their sole currency.^[18][19][20] Further unilateral adoption of the euro (euroisation), by both non-euro EU and non-EU members, is opposed by the ECB and EU.^[21]

Expulsion and secession[link]

While the eurozone is open to all EU member states to join once they meet the criteria, the treaty is silent on the matter of states leaving the eurozone, neither prohibiting nor permitting it. Likewise there is no provision for a state to be expelled from the euro.^[22] Some, however, including the Dutch government, favour such a provision being created in the event that a heavily indebted state in the eurozone refuses to comply with an EU economic reform policy.^[23]

The benefits of leaving the euro would vary depending on the exact situations. If the replacement currency were expected to devalue, the state would experience a large scale exodus of money, whereas if the currency were expected to appreciate then more money would flow into the economy. Even so a rapidly appreciating currency would be detrimental to the country's exports.^[24]

Administration and representation[link]

Euro Group President Jean-Claude Juncker

The monetary policy of all countries in the eurozone is managed by the European Central Bank (ECB) and the Eurosystem which comprises the ECB and the central banks of the EU states who have joined the euro zone. Countries outside the eurozone are not represented in these institutions. Whereas all EU member states are part of the European System of Central Banks (ESCB). Non EU member states have no say in all three institutions, even those with monetary agreements such as Monaco. The ECB is entitled to authorise the design and printing of euro banknotes and the volume of euro coins minted, and its president is currently Mario Draghi.

The eurozone is represented politically by its finance ministers, known collectively as the Euro Group, and is presided over by a president, currently Jean-Claude Juncker. The finance ministers of the EU member states that use the euro meet a day before a meeting of the Economic and Financial Affairs Council (Ecofin) of the Council of the European Union. The Group is not an official Council formation but when the full EcoFin council votes on matters only affecting the eurozone, only Euro Group members are permitted to vote on it.^[25][26][27]

Since the global financial crisis first began in 2008, the Euro Group has met irregularly not as finance ministers, but as heads of state and government (like the European Council). It is in this forum, the Euro summit, that many eurozone reforms have been agreed. French President Nicolas Sarkozy is pushing, as of 2011, for these summits to become regular and twice a year in order for it to be a 'true economic government'.

On 15 April 2008 in Brussels, Juncker suggested that the eurozone should be represented at the International Monetary Fund as a bloc, rather than each member state separately: "It is absurd for those 15 countries not to agree to have a single representation at the IMF. It makes us look absolutely ridiculous. We are regarded as buffoons on the international scene."^[28] However Finance Commissioner Joaquín Almunia stated that before there is common representation, a common political agenda should be agreed.^[28]

Economy[link]

Comparison table[link]

^a GDP in PPP, exports/imports as goods and services excluding intra-EU trade.

Inflation[link]

HICP figures from the ECB, taken from May of each year:^[30]

Interest rates[link]

Interest rates for the eurozone, set by the ECB since 1999. Levels are in percentages per annum. Between to June 2000 and October 2008, the main refinancing operations were variable rate tenders, as opposed to fixed rate tenders. The figures indicated in the table from 2000 to 2008 refer to the minimum interest rate at which counterparties may place their bids.^[3]

Public debt[link]

The following table states the ratio of public debt to GDP in percent for Eurozone countries. The euro convergence criterion is 60 %.

Country	CIA 2007[31]	OECD 2009[32][33]	IMF 2009[34]	CIA 2009[35]	EuroStat 2010[36]
Austria	59.10	72.7	&1000000000000006709999967.10[37]	66.40	&1000000000000007229999972.3
Belgium	84.60	100.4	&1000000000000009370000093.70[38]	101.00	&1000000000000009679999996.8
Cyprus	59.60		&1000000000000005620000056.20[39]	56.20	&1000000000000006079999960.8
Estonia	3.40			7.10	&100000000000000065999996.6
Eurozone					&1000000000000008600000086.0[40]
Finland	35.90	52.6	&1000000000000004400000044.00[41]	40.30	&1000000000000004839999948.4
France	63.90	87.1	&1000000000000007809999978.10[42]	77.60	&1000000000000008170000081.7
Germany	64.90	76.5	&1000000000000007250000072.50[43]	77.20	&1000000000000008320000083.2
Greece	89.50	120.2		113.40	&10000000000000142800000142.8
Ireland	24.90	72.7	&1000000000000006400000064.00[44]	64.80	&1000000000000009620000096.2
Italy	104.00	127.7	&10000000000000115799999115.8[45]	115.80	&10000000000000119000000119.0
Luxembourg	6.40	18.0	&1000000000000001639999916.40[46]	14.60	&1000000000000001839999918.4
Malta				69.00	&1000000000000006800000068.0
Netherlands	45.50	69.4	&1000000000000005889999958.90[47]	60.90	&1000000000000006270000062.7
Portugal	63.60	86.3	&1000000000000007579999975.80[48]	76.80	&1000000000000009300000093.0
Slovakia	35.90	39.8	&1000000000000003570000035.70[49]	35.70	&1000000000000004100000041.0
Slovenia	23.60	44.1		31.30	&1000000000000003800000038.0
Spain	36.20	62.4	&1000000000000005320000053.20[50]	53.20	&1000000000000006010000060.1

Fiscal policies[link]

The primary means for fiscal coordination within the EU lies in the Broad Economic Policy Guidelines which are written for every member state, but with particular reference to the 17 current members of the eurozone. These guidelines are not binding, but are intended to represent policy coordination among the EU member states, so as to take into account the linked structures of their economies.

For their mutual assurance and stability of the currency, members of the eurozone have to respect the Stability and Growth Pact, which sets agreed limits on deficits and national debt, with associated sanctions for deviation. The Pact originally set a limit of 3% of GDP for the yearly deficit of all eurozone member states; with fines for any state which exceeded this amount. In 2005, Portugal, Germany, and France had all exceeded this amount, but the Council of Ministers had not voted to fine those states. Subsequently, reforms were adopted to provide more flexibility and ensure that the deficit criteria took into account the economic conditions of the member states, and additional factors.

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development downgraded its economic forecasts on 20 March 2008 for the eurozone for the first half of 2008. Europe does not have room to ease fiscal or monetary policy, the 30-nation group warned. For the euro zone, the OECD now forecasts first-quarter GDP growth of just 0.5%, with no improvement in the second quarter, which is expected to show just a 0.4% gain.

The European Fiscal Union is a proposal for a treaty about fiscal integration described in a decision adopted on 9 December 2011 by the European Council. The participants are the Eurozone member states and all other EU members except for the United Kingdom. Treaty text is still to be drafted and participation approvals from national parliaments are still to be granted.^[51]

Bailout provisions[link]

The late-2000s financial crisis prompted a number of reforms in the eurozone.^[52] One was a u-turn on the eurozone's bailout policy that led to the creation of a specific fund to assist eurozone states in trouble. The European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF) and the European Financial Stability Mechanism (EFSM) were created in 2010 to provide, alongside the International Monetary Fund (IMF), a system and fund to bail out members. However the EFSF and EFSM were temporary, small and lacked a basis in the EU treaties. Therefore, it was agreed in 2011 to establish a European Stability Mechanism (ESM) which would be much larger, funded only by eurozone states (not the EU as a whole as the EFSF/EFSM were) and would have a permanent treaty basis. As a result of that its creation involved agreeing an amendment to TEFU Article 136 allowing for the ESM and a new ESM treaty to detail how the ESM would operate. If both are successfully ratified according to schedule, the ESM would be operational by the time the EFSF/EFSM expire in mid-2013.

Peer review[link]

Strong EU oversight in the fields of taxation and budgetary policy and the enforcement mechanisms that go with it have sometimes been described as potential infringements on the sovereignty of eurozone member states^[53] However, in June 2010, a broad agreement was finally reached on a controversial proposal for member states to peer review each others' budgets prior to their presentation to national parliaments. Although showing the entire budget to each other was opposed by Germany, Sweden and the UK, each government would present to their peers and the Commission their estimates for growth, inflation, revenue and expenditure levels six months before they go to national parliaments. If a country was to run a deficit, they would have to justify it to the rest of the EU while countries with a debt more than 60% of GDP would face greater scrutiny.^[54]

The plans would apply to all EU members, not just the eurozone, and have to be approved by EU leaders along with proposals for states to face sanctions before they reach the 3% limit in the Stability and Growth Pact. Poland has criticised the idea of withholding regional funding for those who break the deficit limits, as that would only impact the poorer states.^[54] In June 2010 France agreed to back Germany's plan for suspending the voting rights of members who breach the rules.^[55] In March 2011 was initiated a new reform of the Stability and Growth Pact aiming at straightening the rules by adopting an automatic procedure for imposing of penalties in case of breaches of either the deficit or the debt rules.^[56][57]

See also[link]

European Union portal

• Special member state territories and the European Union
• Sixpack (EU)

Notes[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikisource has original text related to this article: Consolidated version of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union/Title VIII: Economic and Monetary Policy

• European Central Bank
• Central Bank Rates, ECB Key Rate, chart and data
• European Commission – Economic and Financial Affairs – Eurozone

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The Edge
Background information
Birth name	David Howell Evans
Born	(1961-08-08) 8 August 1961 (age 50) Barking, Essex, England, United Kingdom
Origin	County Dublin, Ireland
Genres	Rock, post-punk, alternative rock
Occupations	Musician, songwriter, activist
Instruments	Guitar, vocals, keyboards, piano, bass guitar
Years active	1976–present
Labels	Island, Mercury
Associated acts	U2, Passengers
Website	www.u2.com
Notable instruments
Gibson Explorer Fender Stratocaster Gibson Les Paul Fender Telecaster Gretsch Country Gentleman Gretsch White Falcon Rickenbacker 330/12

David Howell Evans (born 8 August 1961), more widely known by his stage name The Edge (or just Edge),^[1] is a musician best known as the guitarist, backing vocalist, and keyboardist of the Irish rock band U2. A member of the group since its inception, he has recorded 12 studio albums with the band and has released one solo record. As a guitarist, The Edge has crafted a minimalistic and textural style of playing. His use of a rhythmic delay effect yields a distinctive ambient, chiming sound that has become a signature of U2's music.

The Edge was born in England to a Welsh family, but was raised in Ireland after moving there as an infant. In 1976, at Mount Temple Comprehensive School, he formed U2 with his fellow students and his older brother Dik. Inspired by the ethos of punk rock and its basic arrangements, the group began to write its own material. They eventually became one of the most popular acts in popular music, with successful albums such as 1987's The Joshua Tree and 1991's Achtung Baby. Over the years, The Edge has experimented with various guitar effects and introduced influences from several genres of music into his own style, including American roots music, industrial music, and alternative rock. With U2, The Edge has also played keyboards, co-produced their 1993 record Zooropa, and occasionally contributed lyrics. The Edge met his second and current wife, Morleigh Steinberg, through her collaborations with the band.

As a member of U2 and as an individual, The Edge has campaigned for human rights and philanthropic causes. He co-founded Music Rising, a charity to support musicians affected by Hurricane Katrina. He has collaborated with U2 bandmate Bono on several projects, including songs for Roy Orbison and Tina Turner, and the soundtracks to the musical Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark and the Royal Shakespeare Company's London stage adaptation of A Clockwork Orange. In 2011, Rolling Stone magazine placed him at number 38 on its list of "The 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time".

Personal life[link]

The Edge at a U2 concert in Anaheim (2005)

David Howell Evans was born at the Barking Maternity Hospital,^[2] Essex, England to Welsh parents Garvin and Gwenda Evans.^[1] When he was one, his family moved to County Dublin, Ireland where he attended St Andrew's National School. He received piano and guitar lessons and often performed with his brother Dik Evans before they both answered an advertisement posted by Larry Mullen, Jr. at their school, Mount Temple Comprehensive School, seeking musicians to form a band.^[3] The band accepted both of them. This band went through several incarnations before emerging as U2 in March 1978 (Dik Evans left the band just before the name change).^[3] U2 began performing in various venues in Ireland and eventually began developing a following. Their debut album, Boy, was released in 1980.

In 1981, leading up to the October tour, Evans came very close to leaving U2 for religious reasons, but he decided to stay.^[3] During this period, he became involved with a group called Shalom Tigers, in which bandmates Bono and Larry Mullen Jr. were also involved.^[4] Shortly after deciding to remain with the band, he wrote a piece of music that later became "Sunday Bloody Sunday".^[3] The Edge married his high school girlfriend Aislinn O'Sullivan on 12 July 1983.^[5] The couple had three daughters together: Hollie in 1984, Arran in 1985 and Blue Angel in 1989.^[4] The couple separated in 1990, but were unable to get officially divorced because of Irish laws regarding marriage annulment; divorce was legalised in 1995 and the couple were legally divorced in 1996.^[4]

In 1993, The Edge began dating Morleigh Steinberg, a professional dancer and choreographer employed by the band as a belly dancer during the Zoo TV Tour. They had a daughter, Sian (born 1997), and a son, Levi (born 25 October 1999),^[4] before marrying on 22 June 2002.^[4] He appeared in the 2009 music documentary film It Might Get Loud.^[6] The Edge has been criticized for his efforts to build five luxury mansions on a 156 acre plot of land in Malibu, California.^[7] The California Coastal Commission voted 8-4 against the plans, with the project described by the commission's executive director, Peter Douglas, as "In 38 years...one of the three worst projects that I've seen in terms of environmental devastation...It's a contradiction in terms – you can't be serious about being an environmentalist and pick this location."^[7] The Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy agreed to remain neutral on the issue following a $1 million donation from The Edge and a commitment from The Edge to designate 100 acres of the land as open space for public footpaths.^[7]

Music style[link]

Guitar playing[link]

As a guitar player, The Edge has a sound typified by a low-key playing style, a chiming, shimmering sound (thanks in part to the sound of VOX AC-30s) that he achieves with extensive use of delay effects and reverb. The feedback delay is often set to a dotted eighth note (3/16 of a measure), and the feedback gain is adjusted until a note played repeats two or three times.^{[citation needed]}

On 1987's The Joshua Tree, The Edge often contributes just a few simple lead lines given depth and richness by an ever-present delay. For example, the introduction to "Where the Streets Have No Name" is simply a repeated six-note arpeggio, broadened by a modulated delay effect. The Edge has said that he views musical notes as "expensive", in that he prefers to play as few notes as possible. He said in 1982 of his style,

"I like a nice ringing sound on guitar, and most of my chords I find two strings and make them ring the same note, so it's almost like a 12-string sound. So for E I might play a B, E, E and B and make it ring. It works very well with the Gibson Explorer. It's funny because the bass end of the Explorer was so awful that I used to stay away from the low strings, and a lot of the chords I played were very trebly, on the first four, or even three strings. I discovered that through using this one area of the fretboard I was developing a very stylized way of doing something that someone else would play in a normal way."^[9]

Many different influences have shaped The Edge's guitar technique.^{[citation needed]} His first guitar was an old acoustic guitar that his mother bought him at a local flea market for only a few pounds; he was nine at the time. He and his brother Dik Evans both experimented with this instrument.^[9] He said in 1982 of this early experimentation, "I suppose the first link in the chain was a visit to the local jumble sale where I purchased a guitar for a pound. That was my first instrument. It was an acoustic guitar and me and my elder brother Dik both played it, plonking away, all very rudimentary stuff, open chords and all that."^[9] The Edge has stated that many of his guitar parts are based around guitar effects. This is especially true from the Achtung Baby era onwards, although much of the band's 1980s material made heavy use of echos.

Vocals[link]

The Edge in June 2005

The Edge also supplies the backing vocals for U2. U2's 1983 live album and video release, Under a Blood Red Sky and Live at Red Rocks: Under a Blood Red Sky are good reference points for his singing (as are the live DVDs from the Elevation Tour, U2 Go Home: Live from Slane Castle and Elevation 2001: Live from Boston). For example, he sings the chorus to "Sunday Bloody Sunday" (Bono harmonizes on the final 'Sunday'). U2 used this tradeoff technique later in "Bullet the Blue Sky" as well. His backing vocals are sometimes in the form of a repeated cry; examples of songs that use this approach include "Beautiful Day", "New Year's Day" and "Stay (Faraway, So Close!)". Another technique he uses in his backing vocals is the falsetto, in songs such as "Stuck in a Moment You Can't Get Out Of", "Sometimes You Can't Make It on Your Own", "A Man and a Woman", "The Wanderer", live versions of "The Fly", and "Window in the Skies".

The Edge sings the lead vocal on "Van Diemen's Land" and "Numb", the first half of the song "Seconds", dual vocals with Bono in "Discotheque", and the bridge in the song "Miracle Drug".^[4] He also sings the occasional lead vocal in live renditions of other songs (such as "Sunday Bloody Sunday" during the PopMart Tour and "Party Girl" during the Rotterdam Zoo TV show when it was Bono's birthday).^[10] He also plays a solo acoustic version of the song "Love is Blindness" that is featured in the documentary film From the Sky Down.

Other instruments[link]

He has played piano and keyboards on many of the band's songs, including "I Fall Down", "October", "So Cruel", "New Year's Day", "Running to Stand Still", "Miss Sarajevo", "The Hands that Built America", and "Original of the Species" and others. He plays the organ on "Please". In live versions of "New Year's Day", "The Unforgettable Fire", "Your Blue Room", and "Moment of Surrender", he plays both the piano and guitar parts alternately. In most live versions of "Original of the Species," piano is the only instrument played during the song. Although The Edge is the band's lead guitarist, he occasionally plays bass guitar, including the live performances of the song "40" where The Edge and bassist Adam Clayton switch instruments.

Solo recordings[link]

In addition to his regular role within U2, The Edge has also recorded with such artists as Johnny Cash, B. B. King, Tina Turner, Ronnie Wood, Jay-Z, and Rihanna. The Edge connected with Brian Eno and Lanois collaborator Michael Brook (the creator of the infinite guitar, which he regularly uses), working with him on the score to the film Captive (1986). From this soundtrack the song "Heroine", the vocal of which was sung by a young Sinéad O'Connor was released as a single.

He also created the theme song for season one and two of The Batman. He and fellow U2 member, Bono, wrote the lyrics to the theme of the 1995 James Bond film GoldenEye. The Edge, along with bandmate Bono, recently composed a musical adaptation of Spider-Man. On May 25, 2011, a single titled Rise Above 1: Reeve Carney Featuring Bono and The Edge was released digitally.^[11] The music video was released on July 28, 2011.^[12]

Musical equipment[link]

Edge's 1964 Vox AC30 on stage in Foxborough for the U2 360° Tour.

The Edge plays electric guitar, acoustic guitar, keyboards, piano, bass guitar (on "40" and "Race Against Time") and lap steel guitar. Compared to many lead guitarists, The Edge is known for using many more guitars during a show. According to his guitar tech Dallas Schoo, a typical lead guitarist uses four or five different guitars in one night, whereas The Edge takes 45 on the road, and uses 17 to 19 in one 2.5-hour concert. He is estimated to have more than 200 guitars in the studio.^{[citation needed]}

Philanthropy[link]

In 2005, The Edge along with Bob Ezrin and Henry Juszkiewicz co-founded Music Rising, a charity that helped provide replacement instruments for those that were lost in Hurricane Katrina. The instruments were originally only replaced for professional musicians but they soon realized the community churches and schools needed instruments as well. The charity's slogan is "Rebuilding the Gulf Region note by note" and has so far helped over a hundred musicians who were affected by Hurricane Katrina. The Edge also serves on the board of the Angiogenesis Foundation, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization dedicated to improving global health by advancing angiogenesis-based medicine, diets, and lifestyle.^[13]

See also[link]

• Timeline of U2
• List of people on stamps of Ireland

References[link]

Footnotes

Bibliography

External links[link]

This article's use of external links may not follow Wikipedia's policies or guidelines. Please improve this article by removing excessive or inappropriate external links, and converting useful links where appropriate into footnote references. (October 2011)

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: The Edge

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: The Edge

• U2.com, official U2 site
• Music Rising
• The Edge at the Internet Movie Database
• The Edge – Album Credits
• A Study of The Edge's Guitar Delay
• The Edge: 'It's all about the vision'
• Food Bank For New York City public service announcement
• Comment on the mathematical analysis of The Edge's guitar sound

Daniel Altman is an American born economist and writer. He is Director of Thought Leadership at Dalberg Global Development Advisors. He is also the founder and president of North Yard Economics, a not-for-profit consulting firm that provides high-quality economic analysis to governments and non-governmental organizations in developing countries. He writes commentary on economics (and occasionally on soccer) in English and Spanish. Altman teaches economics as an adjunct at the New York University Stern School of Business and serves as Chief Economist of Big Think.

Mr. Altman worked for many years as an economic journalist, most recently as the global economics columnist of the International Herald Tribune. Previously, he had been one of the youngest-ever members of the editorial board of The New York Times, under then-editor Howell Raines.^[1] He was also on the staff of The Economist. Outside of journalism, he served as an economic advisor to the British government in 2003 and 2004.

His fourth book, Outrageous Fortunes: The Twelve Surprising Trends That Will Reshape the Global Economy was published in January 2011 by Times Books. His previous books are Power in Numbers: UNITAID, Innovative Financing, and the Quest for Massive Good, co-authored with Philippe Douste-Blazy and published in 2010 by PublicAffairs; Neoconomy: George Bush's Revolutionary Gamble with America's Future, also published by PublicAffairs, in 2004; and Connected: 24 Hours in the Global Economy, published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux in 2007. Both Outrageous Fortunes and Connected have been translated into many languages, including Chinese, Korean, Portuguese, and Spanish.

Mr. Altman received his A.B. magna cum laude, A.M. and Ph.D. in Economics from Harvard University. While at Harvard, he was Editorial Board Chair of The Harvard Crimson.

References[link]