It is no secret that I an a huge fan of the Trans-Siberian Orchestra. Their music is incredible, blending classical style and driving Rock & Roll. How often to you find an orchestra with liberal electric guitar use? The "TSO," as it is abbreviated, is skilled at creating both original music as well as taking classics and reworking them into a unique new form. You don't hear the Trans-Siberian Orchestra on the radio (save near Christmastime, when you will hear "Christmas Eve/Sarajevo" once in a while), but that's okay; you need to listen to the whole album to get the full effect, especially in the rock opera Beethoven's Last Night (which is my all-time favorite TSO album; I'm listening to it right now as I type this in fact).

Paul O'Neill said, when asked what the TSO was about: "It's about creating great art. The purpose of art is to create an emotional response in the person that is exposed to that art. And there are three categories of art; bad art, good art and great art. Bad art will elicit no emotional response in the person that is exposed to it, i.e.; a song you hear in an elevator and it does nothing to you, a picture on a wall that gives you the same emotional response as if the wall had been blank, a movie that chews up time. Good art will make you feel an emotion that you have felt before; you see a picture of a forest and you remember the last time you went fishing with your dad, you hear a song about love and you remember the last time you were in love. Great art will make you feel an emotion you have never felt before; seeing the pieta, the world famous sculpture by Michelangelo, can cause someone to feel the pain of losing a child even if they've never had one. And when you're trying for these emotions the easiest one to trigger is anger. Anyone can do it. Go into the street, throw a rock at someone, you will make them angry. The emotions of love, empathy and laughter are much harder to trigger, but since they operate on a deeper level, they bring a much greater reward."