Shania Twain
Eilleen Regina "Shania" Twain[1] OC (/aɪˈliːn ... ʃəˈnaɪə/ eye-LEEN ... shə-NY-ə; née Edwards; born August 28, 1965) is a Canadian singer-songwriter. She has sold over 100 million records, making her one of the best-selling music artists of all time and the best-selling female artist in country music history.[2][3][4] Her success garnered her several titles, including the "Queen of Country Pop".[5][6] Billboard named her as the leader of the '90s country-pop crossover stars.[7]
This article is about the singer. For her eponymous album, see Shania Twain (album).
Shania Twain
Raised in Timmins, Ontario, Twain pursued singing and songwriting from a young age before signing with Mercury Nashville Records in the early 1990s. Her self-titled debut studio album was a commercial failure upon release in 1993.[8] After collaborating with producer and later husband Robert John "Mutt" Lange, she rose to fame with her second studio album, The Woman in Me (1995), which brought her widespread success.[9] It sold over 20 million copies worldwide, spawned eight singles, including "Any Man of Mine" and earned her a Grammy Award.[10] Twain's third studio album, Come On Over (1997), is recognized by Guinness World Records as the biggest-selling studio album by a female solo artist.[11] It also became the best-selling country album, best-selling album by a Canadian, and one of the world's best-selling albums of all time, selling over 40 million copies worldwide.[12] Come On Over produced twelve singles, including "You're Still the One", "From This Moment On", "That Don't Impress Me Much" and "Man! I Feel Like a Woman!" and earned her four Grammy Awards. Her fourth studio album, Up! (2002), spawned eight singles, including "I'm Gonna Getcha Good!", "Ka-Ching!" and "Forever and for Always", selling over 20 million copies worldwide, also being certified Diamond in the United States.
In 2004, after releasing her Greatest Hits album, which produced three singles including "Party for Two", Twain entered a hiatus, revealing years later that diagnoses with Lyme disease and dysphonia led to a severely weakened singing voice.[13][14][15][16] She chronicled her vocal rehabilitation on the OWN miniseries Why Not? with Shania Twain, released her first single in six years in 2011, "Today Is Your Day", and published an autobiography, From This Moment On. Twain returned to performing the following year with an exclusive concert residency at The Colosseum at Caesars Palace, Shania: Still the One, which ran until 2014. In 2015, she launched the North American Rock This Country Tour, which was billed as her farewell tour.[17][18] Twain released her first studio album in 15 years in 2017, Now, and embarked on the Now Tour in 2018. In 2019, she started her second Las Vegas residency, Let's Go! at the Zappos Theater. Her sixth studio album Queen of Me was released in 2023, and she embarked on the Queen of Me Tour in the same year.
Twain has received five Grammy Awards, two World Music Awards, 39 BMI Songwriter Awards, inductions to Canada's Walk of Fame and the Hollywood Walk of Fame, as well as the Canadian Music Hall of Fame and Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame.[19][20] According to the RIAA, she is the only female artist in history to have three (consecutive) albums certified Diamond by the RIAA[21] and is the seventh best-selling female artist in the United States. Altogether Twain is ranked as the 10th best-selling artist of the Nielsen SoundScan era.[22] Billboard listed her as the 13th Greatest Music Video Female Solo Artist of all time (42nd overall).[7] According to Billboard Boxscore, she is the highest-grossing female country touring artist with $421.1 million gross from her concert tours.[23]
Artistry[edit]
Twain possesses a contralto vocal range.[127][128][129][130][131][132] In 1996, Newsweek defended her from detractors who attributed her refusal to tour at the time to her inability to replicate her studio singing live, describing it as "a warm, languid alto sweetened with a wisp of bedroom allure".[133] Admitting that her singing voice is not as strong as it was prior to her Lyme disease diagnosis, she had to learn how to navigate her new voice in order to continue performing.[134] Prior to her diagnosis, several physicians with whom she consulted throughout the years primarily attribute the loss of her voice to emotional stress, from which she has since recovered after experimenting with various relaxation techniques and devoting a lot of time to vocal warmups.[135] In 2018 she underwent laryngoplasty to have Gore-Tex stabilizers implanted in her throat to reduce the workload on her vocal muscles.[135][136]
She did little writing on her self-titled debut album, but Lange noticed Twain "had a distinctive voice as a songwriter" he felt had been overlooked by other collaborators.[137] Describing Twain and Lange as a "versatile" songwriting duo, Bob Paxman of Sounds Like Nashville observed that their songs explore several themes such as feminism and romantic longing,[127] while Maclean's journalist Brian D. Johnson said her songs "range from domestic-bliss ballads to sassy rockers that taunt and tease."[138] Alanna Nash of AARP observed that Twain crafted The Woman in Me around "hooky melodies and clever wordplay" from her point of view.[135][137] During the 1990s record executives feared her lyrics were too "male-threatening";[134] both The Woman in Me and Come On Over contain feminist and anti-infidelity themes.[139] Although she has become synonymous with singing songs about female empowerment that are "full of attitude", her catalogue also consists of love songs.[140] She believes female singers are often misunderstood for expressing "feminist views" or standing up for themselves, about which she often sings, explaining, "that doesn't mean that we don't love the men in our lives, and that we don't need the men in our lives."[141] She tends to isolate herself when writing songs to avoid distractions, believing she is most productive in this manner.[139] She claims to adapt melancholy experiences into happy songs.[139] Now was the first album she wrote without Lange's involvement, identifying the procedure as a very important songwriting experience because "I needed to do it alone, to start ideas and finish them without relying on anybody else's opinion and direction."[139] Drawing from raw feelings of pain,[135] she also used the album to process the demise of their relationship.[139]
Her primary musical genre is considered to be country pop,[140] with AllMusic critic Stephen Thomas Erlewine declaring that she "Skillfully fus[ed] mainstream, AOR rock production with country-pop".[142] Up is considered to be her most straightforward pop album to-date.[139]
She maintains that she did not dress provocatively for fame, attention or "shock value" but simply because she enjoys her midriff, claiming to have no regrets about her past outfits.[143] She defends contemporary pop stars who dress provocatively, explaining, "I don't think it's too sexy now ...The boundaries are really up to the individual. And then it's up to the viewer whether they like it or not."[143]
She cites Karen Carpenter,[127] Dolly Parton, Mickey Guyton, Taylor Swift, The Chicks, Wynonna Judd, and Kelsea Ballerini as some of the female country artists who inspire her.[144] She has also expressed admiration for country singers Loretta Lynn, Patsy Cline, Tammy Wynette, Reba McEntire and LeAnn Rimes.[141]
Public image and reception[edit]
Despite her success, Twain has been a divisive figure within country music among purists who initially did not take kindly to her "genre-blending".[145] According to biographer Stephen Thomas Erlewine, most critics accused her of "diluting country with bland, anthemic hard rock techniques and shamelessly selling her records with sexy videos."[142] Some country music critics dismissed her music as not being country enough, which some fans theorize resulted in her breakthrough album The Woman in Me being snubbed at the 1995 Country Music Awards, despite its widespread success.[127] Similar to Garth Brooks before her, she was initially branded an interloper whose modern production, presentation and songwriting "disrupt[ed] the genre's status quo".[146] During the 1990s she often received backlash for her unconventionally liberated appearance as a country music singer.[134][143] Despite the breakthrough success of The Woman in Me, early detractors did not take her seriously as an artist, with several music journalists questioning her lyrics, the "manufactured" production of her albums, and her singing ability.[147] Such critics concurred that she had little to offer apart from her sex appeal and music videos,[147] often focusing on her physical appearance instead of her music.[145][148] Early in her career she found herself at odds with the conservative opinions of the country music industry at the time due to her assertive personality and proclivity for wearing revealing outfits that exposed her midriff.[139][143][135] She was constantly deprecated for baring her midriff to the point where critics nicknamed it "The most famous midriff in Nashville",[145] while CMT banned the music video for her debut single "What Made You Say That".[147][149] The Independent's Roisin O'Connor believes "Nashville hadn't seen anything like Twain [before] – a leopard print-loving, midriff-exposing artist determined to be an international star."[139] According to Kristin M. Hall of the Associated Press, since Twain had not yet begun touring, she used music videos to broaden her audience.[150] Similarly, Erlewine considers her to be "the first country artist to fully exploit MTV's style" by cultivating "a sexy, video-oriented image ... that appealed" to both country and pop audiences, largely without touring.[142]
Her record label cautioned her that both men and women would dislike her independence and sexual expressiveness, respectively, but she did not believe them.[139] Record executives warned her that women would feel threatened by her "dressing too sexy".[134] Refusing "to conform to a single archetype of femininity", she recalled that she used music to communicate with like-minded women by alternating between heartbroken, comedic, vengeful, empowered, self-deprecating and lustful personas "all on the same record."[139] Country rock musician Steve Earle famously labelled her "the world's highest-paid lap-dancer."[151] Despite these criticisms her music has largely been embraced by fans.[142][145] In a 2015 profile on Twain, Maclean's Sonya Bell theorized that Twain's early critics would be shocked by her continued success,[147] while American Songwriter's Joe Vitagliano considers her a testament that "critics and the 'industry' aren't quite the 'be-all, end-all' that they think they are".[145] Sarah Koo of Entertainment Tonight Canada wrote that, in hindsight, Twain's image throughout the 1990s seems tame in comparison to the revealing outfits of artists who have since succeeded her.[143]
At one point she was considered to be among the biggest music stars in the world.[151] Journalist Brian D. Johnson wrote that, despite her girl next door image, Twain "has the sort of star power that people expect from royalty", which he attributes to her Cinderella-esque life story.[138] The Guardian's Simon Hattenstone described her as "sexy, empowering and funny. This was a woman who knew what she wanted – men, action, dancing, control."[136] Calling her equally country, pop and rock star, Hattenstone went on to write that Twain is "fancied by the straight boys, admired by the straight girls, adored by gay men as a camp icon and loved by lesbians who read what they wanted into Man! I Feel Like a Woman!."[136] Claiming her stint hosting the 2003 Juno Awards was noticeably void of diva behaviour despite persistent rumours of outrageous antics and demands at the time, Brad Wheeler of The Globe and Mail described her as "an international icon and Canada's sweetheart", a sentiment with which Juno Awards producer John Brunton agreed.[151] Instead Twain relied on her own security, band, production team and assistants.[151]
Endorsements[edit]
In January 2005 Twain joined Scentstories by Febreze to create a limited edition scent disc with the proceeds going to America's Second Harvest.[165] In late 2005 she partnered with Coty to produce her namesake fragrance "Shania" by Stetson. A second fragrance was released in September 2007 called "Shania Starlight".[166] On January 1, 2010, she carried the Olympic Torch through her hometown as part of the 2010 Winter Olympics torch relay.[167]
Personal life[edit]
Twain met producer Robert John "Mutt" Lange after he heard her original songs and singing from her debut album; he offered to produce and write songs with her. Having spoken on the phone for many months, they met at Nashville's Fan Fair in June 1993 and became close. They were married on December 28, 1993, and had a son, Eja (pronounced "Asia"), on August 12, 2001.[168] On May 15, 2008, it was announced that they were separating after Lange had an affair with Twain's best friend, Marie-Anne Thiébaud.[70][71][169][170] Their divorce was finalized on June 9, 2010.[171] On December 20, 2010, it was reported that she was engaged to Swiss Nestlé executive Frédéric Thiébaud, Marie-Anne's former husband.[172][173][174] They were married on January 1, 2011, in Rincón, Puerto Rico.[175][176]
She is a vegetarian[177][178] and a devotee of Sant Mat, an Eastern spiritual philosophy.[179] In 2010 she created Shania Kids Can, a charity designed to address the needs of neglected children who are frequently overlooked by social assistance programs.[180] Her autobiography, From This Moment On, was published on March 27, 2011.[181] She is a long-time resident of Corseaux, Switzerland,[182] where her son was born, and she also owns properties in Las Vegas and the Bahamas.[183][184] When performing in North America, she will sometimes wear the jersey of the local National Hockey League team.[185]
In addition to her various awards for her singles and albums, Twain has received a number of personal honours:
Co-headlining tours
Headlining tours
Residencies