A passion for the season

Trans-Siberian Orchestra Winter Tour 2011, Fri., Nov. 11, 4 & 8 p.m., Mohegan Sun Arena (255 Highland Park Blvd., Wilkes-Barre Twp.). Tickets: $39.85-$69.45 via Ticketmaster, box office. Info: trans-siberian.com

by Nikki M. Mascali
Weekender Editor

There are many words one can use to describe Paul O’Neill, the founder, composer and producer of Trans-Siberian Orchestra.

You can call him talkative, as his interview with the Weekender ran an hour and a half. You can call him intelligent, as he’s a fount of knowledge from topics ranging from the Egyptians and George Washington to movie trivia. But one word that absolutely defines O’Neill to a T is “passionate.”

When he presents the massive entity that is TSO to a crowd, as he’ll do for two performances at the Mohegan Sun Arena in Wilkes-Barre Twp. Friday, Nov. 11, O’Neill wants the audience to see something more than just a show.

“I always tell the kids when they join the band — anyone between 17-25 we call ‘the kids’ — I say that Trans-Siberian Orchestra is technically a progressive rock band,” began O’Neill, who checked in two weeks ago from a pre-production rehearsal in Omaha, Neb. “It’s actually more than that: It’s an idea and an ideal.”

At the core of TSO’s idea and ideal are its fans.

“It’s our job to make people feel emotions that they’ve never felt before, to make the best possible albums, spare no expense, charge the lowest possible price, and on tour, make the best possible live concert and charge the lowest possible prices,” O’Neill said.

It’s evident how important it is to O’Neill that TSO shows be affordable for fans.

“There’s going to be a lot of people in our audience that can easily afford our tickets, but there’s going to be a lot of people in that audience where it’s their one entertainment thing of the year,” he stated. “And we don’t have the right to waste any of their hard-earned money — we have to give them the very best, whether it’s the first show, last show, middle show. For the people in the audience, it’s the first show.”

Despite the economic downturn of the past few years, TSO’s tours have remained a major draw; in fact, the outfit made it into Billboard Magazine’s Top 25 Touring Artists of the Past Decade (1999-2009), and its show attendance was more than 1.1 million people in 2010.

“Let’s use round numbers, and let’s make believe we did exactly 1 million tickets, and let’s make believe that everyone lives a half hour from the coliseum, and the show’s three hours. We don’t have the right to waste 4 million human hours without giving them the very best we can,” O’Neill emphasized.

At home in Wilkes-Barre

So far, 2011’s been what O’Neill called “a wacky year.” Trans-Siberian Orchestra kicked the year off with the PBS special, “The Birth of Rock Theater,” which showcased the group’s rise from its inception in 1993 to its first tour in 1999 and beyond. TSO also took its first trip abroad to tour Switzerland, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Germany and England, and the group worked on two new albums simultaneously.

Friday’s performances at Mohegan Sun Arena will kickoff TSO’s Winter Tour 2011, an eight-month trek that includes 118 performances in roughly 80 North American cities. Starting it all here in Northeastern Pennsylvania was an easy choice for O’Neill.

“Wilkes-Barre is filled with hard-working people who really care, it’s a great rock area,” he said. “(It’s) always had a special place in our heart … the band always feels at home there.”

TSO has performed at the arena more than a dozen times, but one night there in particular is the most memorable to O’Neill: Nov. 17, 2006, when there was an issue with the venue’s water.

“You couldn’t go to the bathroom, you couldn’t wash your hands, the whole nine yards,” O’Neill recalled. “We were stunned because for both shows, everybody showed up. It was unbelievable. I think we were more impressed with the audience that night than the audience was with the band,” he added, laughing.

On this leg of the tour, TSO will perform its debut album, “Christmas Eve and Other Stories” in its entirety, as well as excerpts from “Gutter Ballet and The New York Blues Express,” one of its two upcoming albums that O’Neill described as “kind of gospel meets blues meets rock.”

“We’re playing some new songs this year,” he continued. “We love writing, we love recording, but some of the songs aren’t really born until you play it live.”

Rock, Romanov & Christmas

The other album TSO has in the wings is “Romanov: What Kings Must Whisper,” a rock opera about the Bolshevik Revolution of 1918. “Romanov” was originally supposed to be released as TSO’s first album back in 1994, but was pushed back because there had been talk about taking it to Broadway instead.

“A lot of people heard it and said it was too good to be a rock album,” O’Neill explained.

The idea went far enough into fruition for O’Neill to secure complete artistic control for the project, but because of his background as a rock promoter and producer of groups like Aerosmith and Savatage, “Romanov: What Kings Must Whisper” never did make it onto the Great White Way.

“I grew up in rock,” he said. “We wanted take-your-breath-away production, which Broadway theaters don’t have the infrastructure to do, so I pulled the plug on it because I’d rather it not be done than it be done wrong.”

So back in the mid ’90s, TSO turned its attentions instead to rock operas and Christmas, specifically a trilogy about the holiday. When record executives wondered why TSO would go the latter route, O’Neill cited Charles Dickens.

“Dickens wrote about subjects that were larger than life — the French Revolution in ‘A Tale of Two Cities,’ the industrial revolution with ‘Oliver Twist’ and ‘David Copperfield’ — but he wrote five books about Christmas,” O’Neill said. “And when a British reporter asked him about that, he goes, ‘Christmas is too large a subject to take on in one book.’

“If it’s too big for Dickens in one book, it’s too big for me in one album.”

“Christmas Eve and Other Stories” was released in 1996. “The Christmas Attic” followed in 1998, and “The Lost Christmas Eve” completed the trilogy in 2004.

Trans-Siberian Orchestra also released two non-holiday themed rock operas, 2000’s “Beethoven’s Last Night” and “Night Castle” in 2009. But for many, whether they annually attend a TSO show or use its Christmas trilogy as the soundtrack for their holiday, TSO will always be synonymous with the Christmas season.

For O’Neill, though, no matter how many times he hears “Christmas Eve/Sarajevo 12/24,” “Christmas Canon” or “Wizards in Winter,” it isn’t Christmas until he’s home.

“To me, it’s not Christmas until I sit down with my family at midnight — and I’ve done this since I was 6 — and watch Alastair Sim in ‘A Christmas Carol,’” he shared. “I just love Christmas, everything from the snow to the whole nine yards. It’s always been my favorite day of the year, it’s just so overwhelming, just the way it unites generations, unites the world.”

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